Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu has disclosed that Member of Parliament for Dome-Kwabenya, Sarah Adwoa Safo, may be referred to Parliament’s Privileges Committee by next week.
Adwoa Safo has been absent from the House for an extended period of time without permission from the Speaker for no known reason.
Political commentators have suggested a falling out within the NPP might be responsible for her no-show.
Speaking about her absence on JoyNews’ PM Express, the Majority Leader noted that the Speaker had intended to refer her to the Privileges Committee last week Tuesday, but due to prevailing circumstances had to reschedule.
“My information was that even last Tuesday, the Speaker was going to make a pronouncement on it in the house but I think the circumstances prevented him from so doing. I want to believe that perhaps before the House adjourns tomorrow or maybe next week when the House sits the Speaker may make the announcement by referring her conduct to the Privileges Committee before we adjourn. That’s the information that the Speaker gave to me,” he said.
According to him, even though the Dome-Kwabenya has recently written to the Speaker formally asking for an extension of her leave of absence in Parliament, said request is yet to be authorized by the Speaker.
“Well she requested from the Speaker to be given four more weeks to be absent. The four weeks I guess is ending Friday. It wasn’t granted. The Speaker told me that he had not granted that because you need to be here to make the request, but this was submitted from outside, and even the first one, the first one that’s where she didn’t make a request from the Speaker. So the Speaker said he wasn’t going to accommodate that,” he explained.
Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu revealed that all attempts to get Adwoa Safo back into the House have proven futile, and thus the next line of action lies in the bosom of the Speaker.
“It’s been a long drawn matter, we’ve been having conversations and I think there’s something that is happening and I don’t want to go into it. Unfortunate as the situation is, but certainly a decision will have to be taken one way or the other.
“Well, really when we say that push, in this case, has come to shove and when push comes to shove some decision, some determination has to be made. And so I agree with the Speaker if that determination has to be made it has to be made,” he said.
He further noted that the absence of Adwoa Safo had posed a hazard to the enterprise of the Majority Caucus in Parliament, especially in relation to the passage of the E-levy bill which he believes would have been a walk in the park if she had been present.
“We have been limping I must admit. If she were here this hurdle would have been cleared long ago. We’ve been having conversations about her coming back and she’ll promise and renege on many occasions, but I think all is not right. How to go forward with it is the bigger burden,” he stated.