Majority leader Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu has cautioned that Ghana has only one elected President in the person of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
The country, he said, has one executive President and stressed that no person can pretend to share power with this President whether such a person is a former president or a future president.
Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu was responding to a call by Member of Parliament for Asuogyaman constituency, Thomas Apem Narko during presentation of next week’s Business Statement on Friday, November 4.
The NDC MP had appealed to the Parliament to cut down the number of days it sits from four to two.
This, he said, should be in line with a proposal by former President John Dramani Mahama to organizations to allow those who can work from home to do so because of the hike in prices of petroleum products.
Hon. Apem Nayrko implored leadership of the House to consider scheduling the House to sit for two days instead of four in order to spare members the cost of fuel.
He argued that since Parliament resumed business two weeks ago, plenary has only been spending two hours or less each day and wondered if the days could not be reduced to two and the working hours extended to six or eight hours instead.
He said, “The business for this particular meeting is the 2023 budget and I have observed that for the days that we’ve been here, sometimes we come and in less than two hours we adjourn for the next day.”
“I’m asking whether it will not be possible for the Business Committee to consolidate and pack the activities so that instead of four days we can come like two days in a week in order to be able to save on the amount of money we are using to fuel our vehicles each day.”
The member narrated that on Wednesday he visited a Goil Filling Station to have his tank filled and was given a bill of GH¢3,000, and had to call a colleague for an extra GH¢900, to be able to pay for the fuel.
“Looking at the kind of business that we have, is it not possible… because we can stay for six hours a day instead of coming for two hours and then we go back. Drive here, and two hours later we go back. Pack the day, if even it is eight hours we’ll be willing to stay and do the business for like two days. That way we can save like GH¢500 on fuel every week,” he added.
The Asuogyaman MP explained this is in line with a proposal by President John Mahama to organizations to allow those who can work from home to do so and stressed that the fuel situation is also killing MPs.
The Majority leader rebuffed the call and recounted that in 1998 former President Jerry Rawlings delivered the State of the Nation Address and then opposition leader, John Agyekum Kufuor commented on it.
According to him, President Rawlings was quick to ask Mr. Kufuor to recognize there was only one president in the country.
“May I sound the same and send the same message to my colleagues? There is only one President who has been voted for and there cannot be any pretensions about that,” he stressed.
Hon Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu stated it is when the nation is in dire consequence that members of Parliament are called upon to increase productivity.
He argued that the call for the House to work just two days in a week is a very apocalyptic declaration from the MP.
“What will be the effect on national productivity from this call that you are making? And what would be the effect on GDP,” he quizzed.