Tamale North MP Alhassan Suhuyini breached the rules of Parliament’s Appointments Committee with the questions he posed to Energy Minister-designate Boakye Agyarko on Monday, 23 January, Minority Chief Whip Muntaka Mubarak has said.
Chairman of the Committee abruptly “ruled out” the Tamale North MP and member of the committee from questioning Mr Boakye Agyarko any further after a heated back-and-forth between the two legislators that followed the minority MP’s initial question.
Mr Joe Osei Owusu cut off Mr Suhuyini, who, at the time, was vehemently protesting against the manner in which he was being handled by the chairman after Mr Osei Owusu had intervened to stop him from asking a question pertaining to a money laundering scandal at the Bank of New York where Mr Agyarko had worked prior to his resignation.
The NDC MP said he was merely trying to demand clarity on the circumstances that surrounded Mr Agyarko’s resignation vis-à-vis the money laundering scandal but the chairman of the committee felt Mr Suhuyini was breaching the rules of the sitting by asking such a question.
The sitting temporarily degenerated into a market square atmosphere until the chairman restored order. While explaining to the committee that the New York branch of the bank had nothing to do with the money laundering scandal that happened in the bank’s UK branch, Mr Agyarko wondered why Mr Suhuyini would attempt to link him, in the first place, to a scandal in which neither his bank branch nor his name was implicated.
Mr Suhuyini was subsequently cut off by the chairman as he attempted asking further questions and explaining his reasons for asking the first question.
He complained to the chairman that he was “unhappy” about the way he had been treated on the committee by the chairman.
Speaking on the incident, Wa Central MP Dr Rashid Pelpuo told Joy FM the Minority took serious exception to Mr Osei Owusu’s behaviour, since, in his view, he was “autocratic” by “rudely” stopping Mr Suhuyini in his tracks.
He said the Minority will investigate why the minority members of the committee did not defend their young colleague.
Speaking to Nii Arday Clegg on Starr FM on Tuesday, the Minority Chief Whip said they could not have defended Mr Suhuyini because he broke the rules of the sitting. “In all fairness to the Chair, Hon Suhuyini did not frame his question well. He flouted the rules of the committee. He flouted the rules and we couldn’t have defended him,” he said, adding: “The Chairman denying Hon Suhuyini the opportunity to ask his question is enough punishment”.
Source: Ghana/AccraFM.com
