NPP’s request for Fomena MP to quit Parliament apt, says Inusah

A ranking member of Parliament’s constitutional, legal and parliamentary affairs committee has declared that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) has taken appropriate action by deciding to notify the House that it has disowned the Honourable Member for Fomena, in the Ashanti Region, and demanded his removal from Parliament.

Inusah Fuseini, the MP for Tamale Central, made these comments in an interview with Asaaseradio.com. He said he believes the move will stop the party plunging into anarchy and indiscipline.

Asiamah denounced

“The party’s decision to write to the Speaker to denounce the MP, Amoako Andrew Asiamah, for going independent and also requesting for the Speaker to remove him from Parliament is proper,’’ he said.

The Tamale Central MP explained that “every party must have rules and regulations to guide the conduct of its members. If you don’t enforce those rules and regulations, you are very likely to descend into anarchy and indiscipline.”

Inusah, who is a member of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), says his party would not hesitate to take such a decision if it were confronted with a similar situation.

Differing view

However, a political marketing strategist with the University of Ghana Business School, Dr Kobby Mensah, believes the NPP should wait for the MP to complete his tenure in office before expelling him from the party.

“Instead of the party using a very amicable process in solving the issue, they sometimes handle it in a conflicting way which affects the relationship of the person and the party.

“I think that the party must use a very amicable process to address some of these issues as opposed to having a conflict, because, at the end of the day, we need the votes.’’

He believes the NPP should take a clue from the development to reform the party’s constitution on such matters.

Notification to House

On Tuesday (13 October) the NPP informed the Speaker of Parliament that Amoako Andrew Asiamah was no longer a member of the party.

The expulsion followed the Fomena MP’s decision to stand in the December election as an independent candidate, contrary to the party’s constitution, after losing his seat in the NPP primaries in June this year.

A statement signed by John Boadu, its general secretary, said: “The New Patriotic Party (NPP) wishes to serve notice to the few members of the party who decided to file as independent parliamentary candidates that they have automatically forfeited their membership of the party from the very day they filed with the Electoral Commission (EC) to contest pursuant to Article 3(9) of the NPP constitution.”

The statement said that, by this constitutional injunction, any member of the NPP who supports or campaigns for an independent parliamentary candidate in the lead-up to the general election also automatically forfeits his/her membership of the NPP.

The party further commended members who considered going independent but decided otherwise in the supreme interest of the party.

Fred Dzakpata

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