Executive control, other factors hinder Parliament’s work— NCCE report
A study conducted by the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has concluded that control by the Executive arm of government, corruption, party loyalty and lack of gender balance is hindering the work of Parliament.
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The 2,910 people polled were of the view that the wide gender gap in Parliament had adverse effects on Parliament’s performance, citing the lack of opportunities for female members to speak on issues concerning women as key.
Political partisanship was also mentioned as a hindrance to Parliament as many believed MPs placed party interest ahead of national interest, and also tended to forget the needs of the electorates and focused on their political party agenda.
The study, conducted in September last year, as a national sample survey, covered 72 districts and made use of both primary and secondary data.
A combination of random and purposive sampling techniques were used in selecting the respondents.
The findings of the study were launched in Accra yesterday by the Head of the European Union in Ghana, Mr William Hanna.
Objectives of the study
The main objective of the study was to assess the performance of the Fourth Republican Parliament in Ghana’s democracy.
It sought to achieve this by assessing the public’s knowledge of the role of Parliament and parliamentarians; finding out from the general public how parliamentarians had performed and ascertaining the criteria the public used to measure the effectiveness of Parliament’s work.
Others were to elicit possible changes the public would like to recommend in the Parliamentary system; ascertaining how MPs could be made more effective and finding out from the respondents the factors that in their view hindered Parliament’s work.
Findings
Respondents were generally satisfied with the performance of Parliament as 85.0 per cent were positive in their rating of the performance of the Fourth Republican Parliament.
According to the report, this comprised respondents who rated Parliament’s overall performance as “average”, “above average” and “excellent”.
Those who were not satisfied with Parliament’s overall performance were 15.4 per cent. They rated Parliament’s overall performance as “below average”.
Assessment of specific functions
In the light of differences in administrative strengths and weaknesses, interviewees were asked to give a breakdown of the assessment that resulted in their rating of Parliament’s performance.
Respondents were, therefore, requested to rate Parliament on its specific functions, that is representation, legislation, executive oversight and undertaking development projects in their constituencies.
In terms of representation, nearly half of the total respondents, that is 47. 3 per cent, rated Parliament as performing averagely.
Respondents who rated Parliament’s representative function as above average were 30.9 per cent while 7.5 per cent of respondents rated the same function as excellent.
The remaining 14.3 per cent rated Parliament’s representative function as below average.
On the issue of factors that hindered the effective performance of Parliament, 25.2 per cent of respondents cited Executive control as the major hindrance while 20.3 per cent cited corruption. Also cited was party loyalty (14.4 per cent).
Out of the number that cited corruption as a hindrance to the work of Parliament 94.6 per cent of the respondents were of the view that MPs used their positions to accrue wealth for themselves while just 5.3 per cent felt otherwise.