2022 budget brouhaha: Move on - Varsity don charges Majority, Minority MPs

Following the reversal of the decision to reject the 2022 budget, a Lecturer at the Political Science Department of the University of Education, Winneba (UEW), Dr George Asekere, has urged the Majority and Minority to use the events as a learning curve to deepen the country’s democratic culture.

He said he did not expect the Minority to insist on a reversal of the Majority’s decision, hence the need to move forward in the national interest.

“I think cool heads must still prevail for us to move on. I understand the Finance Minister has made some concessions ...and I think that is something significant,” Dr Asekere said.

Reversal

The Majority in Parliament last Tuesday voted in favour of the 2022 Budget Statement and Economic Policy of the government, overturning the earlier rejection of the budget by the House last Friday.

The approval of the budget was undertaken by the 138 members of the Majority, including the First Deputy Speaker, Mr Joseph Osei-Owusu, who presided over proceedings.

The Minority members, who had voted against the budget last Friday, were not in the Chamber of the House to take part in proceedings leading to the approval of the budget.

Before proceedings started, both the Majority and the Minority sides were locked up in caucus meetings with their leadership, which started just around 10 a.m.

Proceedings in the House started at 4 p.m., but without the Minority side of the House.

Developments

Dr Asekere said following the developments in the House last Tuesday, the “Minority side should not hold the government to ransom at this stage. Let’s move forward and see other ways to mitigate the hardships on Ghanaians.”

Asked about the threat from the Minority on the issue of cooperation in the House, the UEW Lecturer said he believed that would be in the short and medium term and that with time they would overcome that and move on.

He warned that if the Minority did not do that and insisted on voting on any other issue, then the Majority side would have to work harder to ensure compromise else government business would be frustrated.

Dr Asekere insisted that cool heads must prevail on both sides of the House since the members represented the larger interest of the society, adding that “whatever they do is not about emotions; it is about what the people on the ground want”.