Bagbin won’t be used to frustrate Akufo-Addo’s gov’t– Sam George

The Member of Parliament for the Ningo Prampram constituency, Sam Nartey George, says members of parliament from the National Democratic Congress (NDC) have proven to be consensus builders.

Accordingly, he says after yielding the first Deputy Speaker position to the NPP, the NDC also nominated the independent candidate as the Second Deputy Speaker.

In an interview on Accra based radio station Citi FM on Thursday, Mr Nartey said the aforementioned indicates the party’s interest in safeguarding the democracy of the country.

“We have proven to be consensus builders, after seceding the first Deputy Speaker position to the NPP, what did we do? We nominated the independent candidate as the Second Deputy. We have shown our interest in safeguarding the democracy of the country,” he said.

He, therefore, gave the assurance that the NDC will not take advantage of the election of its member, Mr Alban Kingsford Sumana Bagbin as Speaker of Parliament to frustrate President Akufo-Addo in his second term of office.

He said, “If we wanted to hold the President to ransom, the Speaker would not have been allowed to appear for the President’s swearing-in ceremony. We would have just asked the First Deputy Speaker, Joe Osei Owusu to replace him. We are not that kind of party.”

“We heard the Speaker himself say that he is going to discharge his duties without fear or favour. He never showed bias while Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament. Ghanaians can rest assured that under no circumstances will we bring in partisan bias into the working of the House," he added.

Mr. Bagbin was sworn-in as Speaker of Parliament of the Eighth Parliament of the Republic of Ghana on Thursday, January 7, 2021.

The Chief Justice Kwasi Anin Yeboah conducted the swearing-in, taking Bagbin through the required oaths.

Also elected (per consensus) were Messrs Joseph Osei-Wusu (MP for Bekwai-NPP) as 1st Deputy Speaker and Andrew Asiamah Amoako, Independent MP for Fomena as 2nd Deputy Speaker.

Bagbin has been in Parliament since the advent of the 4th Republic and has served virtually in all positions available in the House.

The Clerk to Parliament, Mr Cyril Nsiah declared Bagbin the winner after a rancorous election process characterised by ballots snatching incidents, a military intervention over disputes in how voting should proceed, and near fisticuffs over sitting arrangements.

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