Accra, March 24, GNA- Alhaji Mohammed Mubarak Muntaka, Minority Chief Whip , says Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, Minister of Finance, has refused to honour Parliament’s invitation to answer questions before the House.
He noted that some of the questions to be answered were as old as nine months.
“Mr Speaker, I find this to be very unacceptable, the Finance Minister can find time to go around for various town hall meetings and yet he doesn’t want to come to this House to answer to the representative of the people.
“Mr Speaker, if you check these questions about ten or so of them, about 13 of them Mr Speaker, they have been outstanding for a very long time. Today we are told the finance minister is going to hold a press conference to address the country, he is failing to come to the House to answer the questions. He writes that he is gathering facts on the questions. Mr Speaker, for how long should it take ministers to address this House to answer questions.
And Mr Speaker with your permission, if I may read how long it will take a minister to come and answer questions, Mr Speaker, the minister is supposed to answer questions in the House within two weeks of a notice served him,” he said.
Mr Muntaka raised the concern on the floor of Parliament on Thursday during proceedings when Mr Frank Annoh Dompreh, the Majority Chief Whip directed the Speaker to adopt a motion report of the Finance Committee on Ghana’s subscription to 11, 996 shares allocated by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank Group.
According to Mr Muntaka, the two weeks notice had been standing for over eight months.
“Mr Speaker, I worry that, if we keep accommodating the finance minister’s excuses, these questions will not be answered,” he said.
The Minority Chief Whip pleaded with the First Deputy Speaker, Mr Joseph Osei Owusu, who was presiding, that though the House might be in a hurry, a decisive answer should be given to the minister to come and answer the questions.
“Mr Speaker, we should give a definitive sanction to the finance minister to come and answer the questions.
“So Mr Speaker, if he cannot get time to do the work, he should tell the President, His excellency, but if truly he wants to do the work, he should be answerable to questions and the house and come to the house,” Mr Muntaka said.
Mr Annoh Dompreh, Majority Chief Whip, said the questions advertised in the name of the Finance Minister had gone through proceedings and been admitted by the Speaker.
Debating that the questions had not been advertised for eight months, he said they had gone through the normal process where a working agreement had been adopted between leadership that where a sector minister was unable to attend upon the House at least a correspondence should be received a day ahead of the day the sector minister was expected to answer the said question.
“Mr Speaker, we received his correspondence, I personally followed up to ensure that this correspondence got to this House yesterday, so I can understand the concern of our colleague except to tell our colleague that the Finance Minister has not on any occasion refused to come and attend upon this house and answer questions. So I plead with my colleagues to accord the respect to the deputy in this House and let’s proceed with today’s proceedings,” he said.
Mr Joseph Osei Owusu, First Deputy Speaker, directed the table office and business committee to reprogrammed the questions for the questions to be answered by the minister.
Source: Ghana News Agency
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