Our Honourable Members Of The Ghanaian Parliament

I have always held a strong belief that every member of the Ghanaian parliament is truly honourable until I sat in the public Gallery of the house, watching the business of the day being deliberated. I am without a doubt that the impressions of hundreds of school children who were also visiting the parliament with me on Tuesday, the 10th of March 2015, are also just as good as mine.

The discuss on the business of the parliament was very impressive and both parties were very professional enough to justify the tax payers expenditure on them. Topics after topics where introduced and well deliberated, with the normal parliamentary antics.

I engaged with a lot of the students to sample their opinion on the core purpose of the Ghanaians parliament and the general impression was, it is a place for people of the two political parties to just demonstrate their talking skills, than the arm of the Ghana government responsible for law making for the people of Ghana.

A sight of an parliamentary anomaly caught my attention and I could not believe what I was looking at. I tried catching a picture evidence of this with my mobile phone but was quickly intercepted by the security staffs of the parliament, as it is against the rules to take pictures of honourable members while parliament is in session. I sat at my location transfixed, wondering why none of the accredited media personnel dared to take notice of what I believed to be totally out of place.

Right seated opposite facing the speaker, while parliamentarians were busy debating, is the MP for Adenta whom I learnt is Hon. Emmanuel Nii. Ashie-Moore. This male member of parliament was seated right by a door boldly marked "EXIT". The MP in question was openly eating what I believed to be snack. This individual was also talking to about three more MPs whose business was clearly different from the common business of the house.

This sight of an MP eating on the floor was worsen up by a female MP who stood over the Mr. Asher-Moore, stroking her fingers over his hair, like one playing with a pet.

I could not believe what was happening before me. I could not get the name of the female MP but believed she is of the same p!arty with the Adenta MP. The lady in question is best described as a typical market woman with a vail across her shoulders, betraying a typical Islamic house wife in parliament. The woman is about 5.7", fairly plumpy and light in complexion.

I am of the belief that this woman was snaking out of the floor of the house, after a good day act of bench-warming but in justifying why she should earn her parliamentary sitting allowance, decided to loiter by the idle indisciplined Adenta MP, flirting.

I could not fully comprehend what I was witnessing. The individual confirmed to me as Mr. Ashie-Moore, MP for Adenta by the journalists, is clearly an adult and described as married on Google search. The appearance of the woman in question is that of a Moslem married woman, who is not expected to engage in flirtatious activities of such nature. This was however worsen up by the fact that it was taking place on the floor of parliament, while a member of the house was on his feet debating a matter of national concern.

There are still certain facts that I am very sure of. I believe it is unparliamentary for members to be eating on the floor of the house while the speaker is seated and the business of the day is in progress. Yes, verbal flirting may be part of social interaction among very close members of the house but physical contact of such nature will cause eye brows to raise in any decent society. Finally, I could not get a picture of this as it is against the law of parliament to do so by the members of the public, this is definitely captured on the recordings of the day as every act is supposed to captured on camera.

The law makers were clearly breaking the laws and ethics of parliament. If our law makers are breaking the laws right in the chamber or birth place of the Ghanaian laws, who are expected to be the leaders in upholding these same laws? If our honourable are behaving like young school kids struggling to contain their youthful hormones and taking advantage of isolated place to let it go, how shall our streets be? Please ask yourself if these individuals understand their role in the Ghanaian democratic challenges and join us in proffering lasting solution to these act of gross parliamentary indiscipline.

Kofi Ali Abdul-Yelin
Chair/Coordinator ECRA
(ECOWAS CITIZENS RIGHT ADVOCATES)
[email protected]
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