The General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party, Mr Kwabena Adjei Agyapong, has said the party’s Constitutional and Legal Committee has not been directed to investigate any matter bordering on the suspension or otherwise of the directors of finance and communications.
He has, therefore, said that a verdict by the party’s Constitutional Committee to have Mr Opare Hammond and Mr Okudzeto reinstated as Directors of Finance and Communications respectively is unacceptable.
The two NPP officials were asked to proceed on compulsory leave by the general secretary last month.
However, according to a former Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Prof. Mike Oquaye, who chairs the committee, the committee was tasked to investigate the matter and advise on how to resolve the issue amicably.
After its work, the committee described the move by the general secretary as improper and subsequently directed Mr Agyapong “to retract same and apologise to the Director of Finance,” Mr Opare Hammond.
But in a statement yesterday, the general secretary said the attention of the National Headquarters of the NPP had been drawn to a report from the chairman of the Constitutional and Legal Committee and wished to state emphatically that neither the Steering Committee nor the National Executive Committee or the National Council had referred the matter to the committee.
According to the statement, in good faith and in accordance with Article 9B (5) of the NPP constitution, any report of any standing committee should duly be submitted to the Steering Committee for consideration, but this was not the case.
“Assuming without admitting that the matter was even referred to the constitutional and legal committee, they could only proffer an opinion for consideration. That opinion can only be advisory and not mandatory,” it stated.
It concluded that the “publication of this unsolicited opinion on a purely administrative matter, is improper, an anomaly and a gross abuse of due process in our party.”
