Parliament hit by Minority walkout

Story: Emmanuel Adu-Gyamerah
Frontpage, Feb 20, 2010
concretise their intentions, they moved into the main chamber of the House where the Minority Leader, Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, made the announcement after the Speaker, Mrs Joyce Bamford-Addo, had led the House in the usual daily prayers.
Amidst shouts of “Who born dog? Who born dog?” and the singing of a local tune “Y’eani abre, y’eani abre koo” by the Minority, Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu told the House that what happened to Nana Darkwa was “a national tragedy”.
“In the light of this, the Minority has decided not to participate in the proceedings of the House until further notice,” he said, adding that since Parliament was for Ghanaians, they would keep an eye on what would happen in their absence.
The Minority Leader’s announcement was met with more shouts of “Who born dog? Who born dog?” by the backbenchers of his side, who also sang the last portion of the first stanza of the National Anthem, “And help us to resist oppressor’s rule with all our will and might for ever more.”
The noise intensified when the backbenchers of the Majority side responded by hooting at the Minority with shouts of “Hai, hai, hai”. After the backbenchers of the Minority had left, their leaders remained seated, while the outgoing Deputy Majority Leader, Mr John Akologu Tia, responded and said while the Minority had the right to register its point through staging a walkout, the Majority was of the opinion that the Minority should have allowed the leadership of the House to deal with the matter, instead of taking a unilateral decision.
Mr Tia said what the Minority had done amounted to bending the hand of Parliament, the Executive and the Judiciary to submit to its demand, saying that “that is rather unfortunate”.
He explained that since the matter bordered on the democratic right of an individual, a statement should have been made on the floor of the House to enable as many MPs as possible to speak their minds on the issue.
The outgoing Deputy Majority Leader, therefore, appealed to the Minority to rescind its decision and come back to the House to continue with business.
The Speaker, Mrs Bamford-Addo, also asked the leadership of the Majority to dialogue with their counterparts in the Minority to ensure that they came back to continue with the business of the House.
In another development, despite the boycott by the Minority, the Majority continued with the business of the day, during which the House ratified the petroleum agreement between the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), on the one hand, and Afen Energy Ghana Limited, Gulf Atlantic Energy Limited and Mitsui E & P Ghana Keta Limited, on the other.
The agreement is in respect of a further exploration work in the Offshore Keta Contract Area.
Earlier, during the press conference, Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu had said the Minority was persuaded by the National Anthem to “resist oppressor’s rule”.
“This is our collective resolve,” he said, and appealed to the authorities to cause Nana Darkwa to be immediately released, adding that the Minority was seeking an urgent response to its request.
Meanwhile, in response to the action of the Minority, the Majority Caucus immediately held a press conference after the adjournment of the House, during which the outgoing Majority Leader, Mr Alban Bagbin, repeated the appeal for the Minority to rescind its decision.
He stated that having been a Minority Leader for eight years, he recognised the right of the Minority to stage a walkout but announced that at the time of the Minority’s press conference Nana Darkwa had been granted bail.
“The boycott was, therefore, unlawful and unjustifiable,” he said, and called on the House to continue with the consensus building approach that had become part of the culture of the House to ensure the entrenchment of the country’s parliamentary democracy.