Speaker of first hung Parliament
The outcome of Ghana’s 2020 parliamentary election points to a near-hung Parliament, the first-ever in Ghana’s Fourth Republic.
A hung Parliament may be explained in terms of a legislative arm of government that has no single political party with enough seats to secure an overall majority of membership and votes.
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Currently, according to the Electoral Commission (EC), the New Patriotic Party (NPP) won in the just-ended election with 137 seats, with the National Democratic Congress (NDC) also winning 137 seats.
There is an independent candidate.
The two main political parties have served notice of their intention to challenge some of the parliamentary election results in court.
Regardless of the outcome of the court processes and what the results could be, Ghana is set to witness its first-ever hung or near-hung Parliament in the history of the Fourth Republic.
Depending on how the relationship between the minority and majority is handled, a near-hung Parliament may be a recipe for governance disaster, particularly given how polarised on extremely partisan lines we are and have been as a nation.
It could be used as a countervailing mechanism to deliberately make the country ungovernable, especially when there is no astute politician managing parliamentary business as Speaker.
Unique
To my mind, the current unique Parliament we are yet to inaugurate would have to be chaired by someone who enjoys the support and some respect of both sides and has the pedigree and experience in parliamentary practices.
It will be politically suicidal for such a near-hung Parliament to be chaired by a very accomplished person in his or her chosen career but a political novice and inexperienced person in parliamentary “real-politik”.
That Parliamentary business will be characterised by more rancour, acrimony and bitterness is indubitable.
Without someone who has himself or herself been there before and has been able to endear himself or herself to both sides, parliamentarians will physically fight as they do in other infant democracies, and government business will stall at all times.
Mandate
Even though there are challenges and likely court processes against some parliamentary seats, it appears that per the current numbers, coupled with the fact that the Fomena MP-elect has gone back to the NPP, the mandate to determine who the Speaker of Parliament should be will fall on the NPP.
Ideally, the Speaker position should go to a politically neutral person who enjoys respect across the divide. Unfortunately, politicians on many occasions, since 1992, have tended to favour the appointment of partisan people than neutrals in this and other key positions.
More importantly, the recent conduct and politically ill-timed resignation of Martin Amidu has effectively shut the doors to all cross-party appointments and the quest to look beyond political parties in considering people who are not tainted in partisan colours for appointments.
Hence, the one to be appointed a Speaker will by all means be a known or surreptitious party person.
The person chosen must have the knack of steering the affairs of the type of Parliament we will have.
The Speaker must be able to keep factions in Parliament at bay, and manage them at the same time to ensure they work together.
May the best person with all these attributes be chosen.
Writer’s address: A31, Prabiw PAV Ansah Street,
Saltpond & Kubease,
Larteh-Akuapim.