Speaker of Parliament Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin has directed the leadership of the Majority and Minority caucuses to organize a training workshop for their members.
A budget, he said, has been prepared to fund such a training workshop for members to go through the rules, particularly the etiquette of the House.
The Speaker disclosed he has been getting a lot of calls from Ghanaians expressing concerns about the conduct of members in the Chamber and stressed if he does not convey this to the House, he will be failing in his job as the Speaker of Ghana’s Parliament.
Speaking on Friday after complaints by members that some media houses got their reportage on events of the previous day wrong, the Speaker indicated that journalists cannot be blamed for their errors because many members got it wrong during debate on the floor of the House.
The House on Thursday, February 23 debated a report of the Special Budget Committee on the 2023 budget estimates of the Electoral Commission and a report on a briefing session on the draft public elections (registration of voters) regulations, 2022, and other related matters.
The House subsequently adopted the reports but some media houses reported Parliament had adopted the proposed controversial Constitutional Instrument (CI) of the EC seeking to make the Ghana card the only source document for citizenship for the purposes of registering for the 2024 election.
A meeting of the Committee of the Whole for the EC to brief the House on the new CI was eventually suspended after a confrontation broke out among the members due to the absence of the Chairperson of the Commission.
Speaker Bagbin warned that the legislator is very fragile and urged members to be very careful how they conduct business in the House.
“So this morning when you were talking about the fact that the media got it wrong; they got it wrong because a number of you, during debate on the adoption of the reports, also got it wrong so how do you blame the media for getting it wrong,” he questioned.
He lamented the poor quality of the audio in the Chamber and admitted he struggles to hear members on the floor, particularly the leaders, and indicated the sound is even worse in the press gallery.
He, however, extolled the quality of MPs of the 8th Parliament and indicated he has been in the House since 1993 and described the present composition as one the best if not the best since Ghana reverted to constitutional rule.
He said, “Your quality is very high and you are very articulate and well-informed. The only thing is how to calm your nerves.”