The scheduled Date for the presentation of the budget for the 2022 fiscal year in the Parliament of Ghana, has once again been Changed from 15th November to the original 17th November date.
A communication from the Speaker read on the Floor of Parliament on Wednesday, November 10, 2021, indicated that, “Parliament has an equally important assignment to perform on 15th of November.”
It was earlier communicated at the beginning of this third meeting by the leadership of the House that, the President Akufo-Addo led Government’s fiscal policy for the coming year would be presented to the House on November 7, 2021.
However, the Deputy Majority Leader, Alexander Afenyo Markin, informed Parliament last Friday of the decision of the Business Committee to shift the date from 17th to 15th November when presented the Business statement to the House on behalf of the substantive Majority Leader and Leader of Government Business who is on assignment outside the jurisdiction of Ghana.
In another development, the Parliament of Ghana had to Suspended for an Hour for lack of quorum.
Proceedings on the Floor of Ghana’s Parliament came to an abrupt end shortly after it had started sitting few minutes to midday on Wednesday, November 10, 2021.
The presiding Second Deputy Speaker, Andrew Asiama Amoako, had no other choice than to suspend the House for an hour after the MP for Adaklu, Governs Kwame Agbodza had made an application for lack of quorum.
The MP relied on Order 48 of the Standing Orders of Parliament to point out that the House was not properly constituted to take decisions for the good people of the country.
There were only a handful of MPs present on the Floor at the time of the call. When the mandatory 10 minutes grace period for the whips to whip up members to attend to the House was up, the numbers were still not encouraging.
The House was therefore suspended to regroup after an hour. The House was finally adjourned about an hour after it returned from the suspension because it could still not raise a quorum of at least 92 MPs to satisfy the provisions of Order 48 of the Standing Orders of Parliament which requires one-third of the 275-member Parliament to conduct business in the Chamber.
There were 15 Parliamentary questions scheduled on the Order Paper for the day which went unanswered. There were also Bills to be presented; motions to be taken; and statements to be made concerning issues bordering the people, however none of these were attended to because the House was not properly constituted for Parliamentary business according to the Standing Orders of Parliament.
Source: Clement Akoloh||parliamentnews360.com
