National democratic Congress’ Member of Parliament for Tamale Central, Ibrahim Murtala Mohammed says his party has shown weakness by allowing a controversial Legislative Instrument aimed at regulating the price of cement to be laid.

This comes after the Majority Chief Whip, Kwame Governs Agbodza explained that the minority allowed the LI to be laid because it now requires cement manufacturers to report pricing decisions to the government, rather than directly regulating prices.

Speaking on the floor of Parliament on July 2, he said, “The last time the minister was here, colleagues from both sides had serious concerns."

"Those concerns have been sent back to the committee and have been addressed. We are okay to support it. At least what I have been told is that it is not about price control. The price control element has been taken out. It is about reporting the price to the committee and if that is the case it is no longer a controversial issue.”

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However, the Tamale Central MP stated that the NDC had opposed the LI on principle from the beginning.

“This morning, I raised concerns about the possibility of having this LI laid. I went to the leadership and I told them that we should not allow this LI to be laid. And the argument was that there has been some proposal amendment to the proposed LI. What amendment?”

According to Mr Mohammed, the current government is using this LI to hide its failures as a government.

“The point is that government is hiding behind this LI to admit that they have failed as a government. The reason why prices of cement are escalating is not because of the absence of LI to regulate pricing or determine reporting as they claimed. It is because of how badly the economy is run. It is because of the input used to produce this cement which is imported into this country. “

“Import duties have escalated. It is because the cedi has lost so much value that they need these dollars or other foreign currency to bring in the input. There can’t be any justification for this.”

“They have succeeded in laying it which is against some of us our position and I made my position very clear to the leadership that I am very much against it. And when it comes to the debate, we will speak out strongly. We must not allow this thing to go on. It is just unacceptable,” he said.