Tamale North Lawmaker Alhassan Suhuyini has asked the Majority to focus on their work in Parliament and allow the Minorty to engage in the boycott to support their members who are standing trial in court.
Suhuyini said that with 138 members, the Majority should be able to do their business in the House without the presence of the Minority.
His comments come after the Majority Chief Whip Frank Annoh-Dompreh criticized the opposition legislators for their boycott.
Annoh-Dmporeh stated that the decision by the minority has divided their members.
He asked the leadership of the Minority to bury their heads in shame following this decision.
“I think that they should bury their heads down in shame, it is a very unpopular decision by the leadership, I know their side is divided about it,” he told journalists in Parliament on Tuesday, July 18.
Annoh-Dompreh further accused the Minority of deception with regard to their boycott.
He stated that whereas the Minority wants the entire nation to believe that they are boycotting parliament by not showing up in the chamber, they quietly take part in committee sittings in Parliament.
The Nsawam Adoagyiri lawmaker said “we were patiently counting that they will meet the mark and then we see what happens only for me to have the rude shock of my life, the Minority participated in a two committee meetings yet they refused flatly to show up in the chamber. What kind of principle are they espousing?
“This is an act of deception. I want to challenge my friend the Honourable Ato Forson that he should show true leadership. If you are boycotting, boycott it through and let’s see that you are boycotting it. I also want to tell the Ghanaian people that they shouldn’t take the Minority seriously.”
But Suhuyini replied to him on News 360 on TV3 Tuesday, July 18 that “Parliament is more or less about doing government business, the majority of 138 members … they rather make it look like our decision to boycott is aimed at sabotaging government business but where are the government MPs.”
Last week Speaker Alban Bagbin asked the Minority Caucus to present a written, not oral, permission before being recognized as absent with permission on days they go to court to solidarize with their colleagues standing trial.
“So the burden will now shift onto you as a group to show evidence that my good self has granted you permission to absent yourselves in writing.”
The Minority, immediately after the swearing-in of Assin North Member (MP) James Gyakye Quayson, announced its decision to boycott proceedings each time he appeared before court on his criminal charge.
So far, two boycotts have been staged and both have been marked as absent for the Minority members and this is what is not going down well with them.