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Minority stage walk out over Mummuni’s vetting
Accra, Feb. 9, Ghanadot/GNA – The Minority side of the
Appointments Committee of Parliament on Monday walked out of
its sitting in protest to the Chairman’s ruling on the
vetting of Alhaji Mohammad Mummuni, Minister-Nominee for
Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration.
After almost an hour of back and forth on whether the
nominee should be vetted or not since there was petition by
Alliance for Accountable Governance (AFAG) against his
nominations.
The petition, as cited by the Chairman of the Committee, Mr
Edward Doe Adjaho, alluded to a 2004 forensic audit report
from the Auditor General’s Office, which made allegations of
fraud against the Nominee.
The Nominee had the opportunity to explain that the matter
was in court and that he was seeking four relieves against
the Auditor-General and three other defendants.
Based on the submission of the Nominee, members took turns
to cite Order 93 (1) of the Parliament Standing Orders to
say that Parliament and for that matter the Committee needed
to wait for the matter to be determined by the courts before
proceeding with the vetting of the Nominee.
But Mr Adjaho ruled that to the extent that the forensic
audit report did not emanate from a Commission or Committee
of Enquiry, the Committee was not bound by its contents so
the petition should be set aside for the vetting of the
Nominee to continue.
“Moreover since the Nominee is qualified to be a Member of
Parliament he is equally qualified to be a Minister of
State, according to the Constitution,” he said.
The Minority Leader, Mr Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu described the
ruling of the Chairman as “bogus” in the light of one of the
Committee’s own yardsticks, which stated that in the case of
allegations of fraud such as was contained in the audit
report, the Committee should wait for the matter to be
determined by the courts before proceeding with vetting.
“You handed this yardstick to us and now you are turning
around to make a ruing that does not uphold your own
yardstick and you expect us to stand by your ruling?
“You can’t have your way through whimsical and capricious
rulings.”
The Chairman insisted that the Minority Leader should follow
due process in challenging his ruling and that his ruling on
the matter was final.
The Minority Leader then stood up and led his members out of
the meeting, while the Majority Members continued to vet the
Nominee.
AFAG recently made a public pronouncement in the contents of
their petition against the nominations of four
Minister-Nominees.
In the case of Alhaji Mummuni, it was in respect of 2004
four forensic audit report citing him for fraud in the case
of some 1.3 billion Ghana Cedis that the State lost in
respect of some projects at National Vocational Training
Institute (NVTI) during his tenure as Minister of Employment
and Social Welfare.
But when the Minority walked out the remaining Majority
members continued and finished vetting Alhaji Mummuni, who
answered questions with regards to regional integration, the
relevance of Ghana’s foreign policy to the people of Ghana
and also about how to pursue economic diplomacy for the
benefit of the citizenry.
GNA
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