Parliament will formally launch Ghana’s 30th Anniversary of Parliamentary Democracy under the Fourth Republic.
The launch, scheduled for Wednesday, 22nd February 2023 at 9.00am will herald a year-long celebration, marked with various activities, according to a release from the Public Directorate of Parliament.
The celebration is under the theme ’30 Years of Continuous Parliamentary Democracy: Prospects and Challenges.’
The practice of Parliamentary democracy has deepened since inauguration of the First Parliament on 7th January 1993 and Ghana’s Parliament is currently one of the most studied in Africa and the world.
The membership has also grown since its inception from 200 MPs in 1993 to 230 MPs at the beginning of the 4th Parliament in 2005 and then to 275 MPs at the beginning of the 6th Parliament in 2013.
The 4th Republican Parliament has so far had seven Speakers, with the first Speaker, Rt Hon Justice Daniel Francis Annan, being the only Speaker to serve two terms.
The only female Speaker was the Rt. Hon. Joyce Adeline Bamford Addo, who was the Speaker of the 5th Parliament.
The number of female MPs have been relatively low over the past thirty years and have represented less than 20 percent of the membership of the House since 1993.
This notwithstanding, there has been a marginal increase in the number of female MPs from 16 in 1993 to 40 in 2021.
The uniqueness of Ghana’s Parliament is due to its hybrid nature, which is a combination of the British Parliamentary and American Presidential systems.
This has been a source of fascination to many democracies and has put Ghana in a unique position among her peers.
Discussions on how to harness the advantages of this system, minimize the disadvantages and challenges of the system, and whether or not Ghana should return to the practice of strict separation of powers, have been held at both national and international levels.
Since the turn of the 4th Republic, Parliament has passed over 1000 Bills into law.
These include the Right to Information Act, the National Identification Authority Act, the Interpretation Act, the Food and Drugs Act and the Domestic Violence Act, among many other significant Bills.
The official launch will be broadcast live on the Ghana Television channels and all the Parliament of Ghana electronic channels and internet handles. Attendance, however, is strictly by invitation.