A Political Science lecturer at the University of Ghana, Professor Ransford Gyampo, has demanded a total overhaul of the Majority leadership in Parliament.

Describing the posture of the Majority side as hawkish, he insisted they must be relegated to the backbench.

Prof Gyampo argued that the pronouncement of the leadership frustrates efforts at building genuine consensus. 

He said this in a JoyNews Hotline Documentary, ‘Ghana’s Hung Parliament; blessing or a curse?’.

“When you listen to some of the utterances of the current leadership in Parliament, you’d be angry.

“Some of them are overly partisan, and they sound politically nauseating to the extent that what they say frustrates any effort to ensure genuine consensus,” he argued.

According to him, the nature of the current Parliament requires more dialogue and consultations, unlike previous instances where one party had a clear majority.

The University of Ghana UTAG Secretary emphasised that “political sobriety, political temperament and political tolerance are key attributes of the calibre of leaders you need to lead deliberations in a hung Parliament.”

“In a hung Parliament, it doesn’t matter whether you’ve been an MP for 20 or 30 years; if you are a political hawk, you must take the backbench and bring in people who are sober, people whose utterances would necessarily a certain agreement from the other side,” he suggested.

On November 26, 2021, a one-sided Minority voted to reject the 2022 budget after the Majority group staged a walkout.

This opened the floodgates for attacks on the Speaker on the suspicion that he engaged in illegality when he allowed for the rejection of the budget, knowing that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) MPs did not have the needed number in the House.

The Majority group later rescinded and approved the budget with the First Deputy Speaker, Joseph Osei Owusu, presiding over the House.

Executive Director of the Africa Centre for Parliamentary Affairs, Dr Rasheed Draman, has observed that the Majority side, despite happenings in the Chamber, must be circumspect in their handling of the Speaker.

“The Majority side should be very measured in the kind of pronouncements that they make about the Speaker.”

“I have not seen any Speaker who has been challenged in the Fourth Republic more than this Speaker within this space of one year,” he noted.