The Builsa South MP has criticised president Akufo-Addo’s ‘selective’ enforcement of his Executive Instrument 64 (EI64) on Covid-19 safety protocols.

Dr Clement Apaak said national unity is affected when members of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) to go unpunished after blatantly breaching Covid-19 protocols during the party’s recent parliamentary primaries.

He said the president’s actions are divisive, discriminatory and “go further to divide the country,” as prior to the NPP primaries, “pastors and ordinary citizens have been punished for failing to adhere to the directives contained in the laws developed to help the government and the nation fight the coronavirus.”

The legislator said the president’s response to the breach of protocols by his party members was unsatisfactory and proved that the President only assumed office to serve a select group of Ghanaians and not the entire citizenry.

“To close churches and order citizens about in a certain manner without same applying to his party members, smacks of hypocrisy, divisiveness, and is detrimental to national unity. “

Dr Apaak has, therefore, added his voice to calls for church members and ordinary citizens who had breached the Covid-19 protocols to be pardoned as well.

During the just ended NPP primaries, party officials and members had blatantly breached Covid-19 protocols.

This had received some backlash from Ghanaians who were irate at their flagrant breach of protocols and the inaction on the part of the Ghana Police Service to identify and arrest the culprits as they had done ordinary Ghanaians and church leaders etc.

Speaking at his acclamation ceremony following a week of silence, President Akufo-Addo pardoned his party members for their actions;

“This past weekend, our party came to the end of the process that we have to go through to prepare for the elections in December with the primaries in the constituencies where we have sitting MPs.

“Unfortunately, in our enthusiasm and sheer, unbridled joy, we broke some of the COVID-19 safety protocols. It should not happen again,” he said.

As a result, the Minority in Parliament, church leaders and the general citizenry have called on the government to release prior culprits as a failure to do so “goes to strengthen suspicions that he assumed political office to serve the singular interest of his party and its members, while disregarding the rights and liberties of those not found within his party.“