Clip Off Some EC Powers- Ala Adjetey
THE FORMER Speaker of Parliament, Hon Peter Ala Adjetey has called for the review of some aspects of the 1992 Constitution which sought to give power to the Electoral Commission (EC) to suspend or revoke the registration of political parties.
He contended that if political parties were to be democratic in their organisations and operations as required by the Constitution, their power to exist and carry out their duties should be vested in the High Court of Justice.
Hon. Adjetey made the suggestion on Monday at a day's workshop in Accra organised by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) to give members of the Parliamentary Select Committees on Finance, Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affair the opportunity to review and make the necessary inputs into the bill of State Funding of Political Parties and the Political Parties Bill.
He said the right to form political parties was a constitutional one and when that had been exercised, it should not be opened to be set at by non-judicial processes.
“The right to suspend or revoke the registration of political parties should be vested in the high court of justice which may exercise such power applying a summary procedure which will allow for swift determination of such matters with the usual rights of appeal to the Supreme Court,” he said.
The former Speaker of Parliament added that to facilitate and expedite the disposal of proceedings brought before the High Court under the proposed political parties law, it had been suggested that the provisions of Order 55 of the High Court Rules, 2004 dealing with applications for judicial review, should apply to all cases brought to enforce any provisions of the new political parties law.
Director of the Legon Centre for International Affairs (LECIA), Professor Kofi Kumado said the state expects some level of obligation from political parties and that it was important for the state to support them meet those expectations.
Professor Kumado, who was tasked to draft a bill on the proposed Public Funding of Political Parties, said the draft proposes among other things that two percent of revenue generated from the Value Added Tax (VAT) should be used as the main fund for political parties' activities, adding that did not call for an increament in VAT.
He noted that the proposed bill would also look at the possibilities of re-imbursing of political parties' expenditure for their parliamentary and presidential elections and their general administration.
Professor Kumado said the proposed bill would also allocate 10 percent of the fund to parties who elect at least 30 female Members of Parliament, saying the fund would not be able cover the entire budget of all political parties.
A Senior Fellow at the IEA, Brig. General Francis Agyemfra maintained that political parties were critical to the establishment, sustenance and consolidation of any multi-party endeavour, and added that it was imperative that various pieces of legislation affecting them were liberal, flexible and friendly towards their objectives.
The Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Peter Mac Manu pledged his party's support for the proposed bill, noting that there was the serious need for the state to support political parties.
He added that even in some African countries such as Mali, Zimbabwe and Tanzania, there exist some form of support by the state for political parties.
The workshop brought together leading political parties in the country such as the NPP, National Democratic Congress (NDC), the People's National Convention (PNC), the Convention People's Party (CPP) and others.By Abubakar Salifu