Parliament Rises

THE THIRD session of the Fourth Parliament of the Fourth Republic ended yesterday after 36 days of sitting.

The first meeting of the fourth session of the Fourth Parliament is tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, January 22, 2008.

Hon. Abraham Ossei-Aidooh, Majority Leader and Member of Parliament (MP) for Tema West said this on the floor of the House when he presented the Business Statement for the first week of the first meeting of the fourth session.

The House later commended Joseph Agbeko, also known as “King Kong”, for wining the new International Boxing Federation (IBF) Bantamweight World Champion on September 29, 2007 after dethroning Luis Alberto Perez.

This followed a statement presented by Hon. Albert Zigah, MP for Ketu South, who asked the House to recognize the achievements of Agbeko, for bringing honour to the country.

According to him, the nation, which was well-known for its boxing exploits, was left without champions after great men of iron fists such as D.K. Poison, Azumah Nelson and Bazooka Quartey had retired.

He said the fighting record of Agbeko, who had 26 fights with 25 wins, 22 of which were by way of knockouts and one loss, was impressive, and expressed confidence that Agbeko would bring back the days of the boxing legends.

The Ketu South MP recommended that the Ministry of Education, Science and Sports, through the Select Committee of Parliament, launch a study on why Ghana had not been able to produce world champions even though they had good boxers around for a long time.

He said it was necessary that the nation found this out because in doing so, the shortfalls would be identified and corrective measures taken to ensure that more champions like Agbeko were produced.

He urged the Education and Sports Ministry to allocate more resources and pay more attention to boxing in order to improve standards in the boxing field.

“Although boxing has brought us great honours in the past, its home and heart, Bukom, as well as other training grounds are denied of modern training facilities.

“The days where our boxers have to be based outside the country before they can achieve laurels should now be over,” he said.

Hon. Zigah noted that Agbeko, who is seriously preparing for the title defence on 2nd February, 2008 in New York, USA, needed the support of the whole nation.

By Sylvanus Nana Kumi & Ethel Kangberee