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The 4 MPs cannot be said to have crossed carpet in this Parliament - former President Kufuor [VIDEO]
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The 4 MPs cannot be said to have crossed carpet in this Parliament - former President Kufuor [VIDEO]

Enoch Darfah Frimpong Politics 10 minutes read

The intentions expressed by four Members of Parliament to contest the December 7, 2024 parliamentary elections in different capacities from the status on which they are presently in Parliament cannot be concluded as 'crossing carpet,' former President John Agyekum Kufuor has said,

He said Ghanaians were watching what was happening in the House of Parliament and therefore there was no need to use any "tactics" or "technicalities" to disturb the peace of the country when Ghanaians were well aware of how they want to vote for which side to lead the House.

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Touching on the reasons for which the Speaker of Parliament, Alban S.K. Bagbin recently informed the House that four members have crossed carpet and that their seats have become vacant, a matter which was presently before the Supreme Court for interpretation of Article 97, Mr Kufuor said in his understanding, he does not believe that it can be concluded that the said four Members of Parliament have crossed carpet in this present Parliament, since their intentions are geared towards the next Parliament, which starts on January 7, 2025.

To him, he does not understand why this issue should bring a standoff.

If the Speaker has said he has not declared any seat vacant, he should therefore allow the status quo to remain for the sake of the country so that the present term of this Parliament can end beautifully.

Former President Kufuor said this in an interview with Asempa FM's Osei Bonsu on Friday [Nov 8, 2024].

Watch attached video below

Mr Kufuor emphasised the importance of Speaker Bagbin’s role in resolving the impasse and called on him to prioritise stability and decorum in the House.

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He warned that if left unchecked, the current situation could damage Bagbin’s reputation and undermine his contributions to Ghana’s political landscape.

I will plead with the Speaker of Parliament to step up and show leadership. What’s happening in parliament is embarrassing. It can destroy his "record", he said.

Mr Kufuor urged Speaker Bagbin to show leadership in the current parliamentary stand-off, describing the situation as embarrassing.

The former President said Speaker Bagbin has all the solutions to the current standoff in his bosom, and urged him to exercise strong leadership in the ongoing stand-off over sitting arrangements.

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Mr Kufuor said the onerous was on Speaker Bagbin to maintain sanity in the House, especially when he has already explained that he has not made any ruling on the said four seats.

He said the Speaker should ask the members to allow the status quo to remain for everybody to sit at where they were originally sitting before the recent developments with only a few weeks to the end of the life of this Parliament.

He said the Speaker acknowledges that he is "number 3" in terms of the leadership structure in the country and with about a month to the end of the life of this Parliament, where he has served very well, he should not allow this development to tarnish the image of his "record."

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He said the House needs to sit to be able to receive the President's last State of the Nation address, prepare transitional arrangements, the budget and other bills and this is the time to do all that.

Watch a video of the interview below

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What happened?

Drama in Parliament: Speaker declares 4 seats vacant - 2 NPP, 1 Independent, 1 NDC

The Speaker of Parliament, Alban S.K. Bagbin on October 17 declared four parliamentary seats vacant on the premise that the current occupants have defected by filing to contest the next elections on tickets different from what they represent in the current Parliament. 

The ruling effectively ended the tenure of Agona West Member of Parliament (MP), Cynthia Morrison of the New Patriotic Party (NPP); Amenfi Central MP, Peter Yaw Kwakye-Ackah of the National Democratic Congress (NDC); Suhum MP, Kwadwo Asante of the NPP, and Fomena MP, Andrew Asiamah Amoako, an independent MP.

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Ms Morrison, Mr Asante and Mr Kwakye-Ackah have all filed as independent candidates for the December 7 elections, while Mr Asiamah Amoako, who was the Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament until Mr Bagbin’s ruling, filed to contest the Fomena seat on the ticket of the governing NPP.

The about 12-minute ruling, read to one of the quietest halls in Ghana’s legislature, was followed by near chaos as the NPP members stood up and converged on the back of their side before the Speaker urged the marshals to walk them out.

Context

The issue had been triggered by former Minority Leader and MP for Tamale South, Haruna Iddrisu, who petitioned the Speaker to remove the four from the legislature for holding allegiance to entities different from what they represented in the current Parliament.

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Mr Iddrisu had tabled the petition on the strength of portions of Article 97 of the Constitution, arguing that those provisions of the Constitution abhorred the switch in allegiance midway through a parliamentarian’s tenure.

Indeed, Article 97(g) states that a Member of Parliament shall vacate his seat in Parliament “if he leaves the party of which he was a member at the time of his election to Parliament to join another party or seeks to remain in Parliament as an independent member”, while Article 97(h) states that the member would forfeit his seat “if he was elected a Member of Parliament as an independent candidate and joins a political party”.

Haruna Iddrisu did not move his petition on the floor of the House by a motion.

However, the Minority Leader from NDC side, Dr Cassiel Ato Forson made a statement on the floor on the issue.

It is based on Ato Forson's statement that the Speaker agreed, stating in his ruling that the relevant MPs had, by their actions, vacated their seats in Parliament.

However, after later developments with the matter being challenged at the Supreme Court ex parte, and following the Supreme Court's order asking the Speaker's ruling to be stayed until the final determination of the matter - interpretation of Article 97 - Speaker Bagbin at a press conference on Wednesday [Nov 6] said he did not rule on anything and that he only provided an information to the House.

Role of Speaker

Mr Bagbin said the Speaker was called upon by the Standing Orders of Parliament, particularly Order 18, to inform the House of the occurrence of a vacancy of the seat of a member under Clause (1) (b) to (e), (g) and (h) of Article 97 of the Constitution.

“Accordingly, I proceed to inform the House that by the notification of the polls the following Members of Parliament have by their actions vacated their seats in Parliament,” he stated. 

Basis of ruling

Providing his understanding of Article 97 of the Constitution, Speaker Bagbin said at the core of the Minority side’s statement were the provisions of Article 97(1) of the Constitution of Ghana, 1992, which governed the circumstances under which a Member of Parliament shall vacate his/her seat in Parliament.

The Speaker stated that Article 97(1)(g) and (h) operated to prevent what the old school referred to as “cross carpeting” or “carpet crossing” as witnessed in the early Legislative Councils and Parliaments of the Gold Coast and the Republic of Ghana respectively.

Cross-carpeting was now part of “defection” or “party switching”, when an MP who was elected on the ticket of one political party leaves that party to join another, or when an independent MP joins a political party after being elected as an independent member or a party member acts similarly.

To his mind, the concept of defection raised significant concerns about the integrity of political representation.

“When voters elect a candidate, they do so based not only on the individual’s personal qualities but also on the political party platform they represent.

Party-switching or defection, therefore, can be seen as a breach of the mandate and social contract between the MP and the electorate, as it changes the political dynamics that the voters originally endorsed,” Mr Bagbin said.

He added that the prohibition of defection, as reflected in Article 97(1)(g) and (h), served several critical purposes in maintaining the integrity of Parliament, parliamentarians, and protecting the trust and will of the people.

Mr Bagbin also indicated that those provisions were designed to safeguard the principles of party loyalty, voter representation, and political stability.

“Defection is prohibited because it undermines the trust placed in MPs by their constituents and can lead to instability in Parliament.

These constitutional safeguards ensure that Members of Parliament remain accountable to both their parties and the electorate, and they prevent MPs from engaging in behaviour that could amount to fraud or disruptive of the functioning of Parliament,” Speaker Bagbin ruled.

The Speaker disagreed with suggestions that those provisions which addressed the vacation of an MP’s seat due to defection should apply only to future parliaments and not to the term of office of Parliament, dismissing it both as untenable and inconsistent with the constitutional purpose of those provisions.

Mr Bagbin said to the extent that those provisions were designed to prevent political instability, opportunistic behaviour, fraudulent representations and disruption of parliamentary composition during the term of a Parliament, to understand those provisions as only applying prospectively would nullify the purpose of Article 97 and render them effectively superfluous.

“By the time the next Parliament is constituted, any MP who has defected or switched political allegiance during the current Parliament would no longer be in violation of the provision — they would start the next term aligned with their new party or as an independent,” Mr Bagbin explained.

The Speaker pointed out that in the present matter before the House, the notice of poll was available at the Electoral Commission on all the 275 Constituencies of which he had duly taken note. 

NPP’s argument

The Majority Leader, Alexander Afenyo-Markin, after the ruling and a banter with the Speaker on the floor of the House, led his side out of the House.

Speaking briefly to the press, he said his side was immediately boycotting Parliament until the matter was settled.

He said the writ he filed at the Supreme Court seeking interpretation of the matter was pending, and thought that the Speaker would wait upon the apex court to interprete the Constitution, adding that “the issues we have raised are issues of interpretation”.

“The Speaker had no business doing this. He did this just to give advantage to the NDC,” Mr Afenyo-Markin stated.

Writer's email: enoch.frimpong@graphic.com.gh 

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