Dr Forson explains why Minority staged the boycotting of the approval of Ministerial Nominees

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament (MP) for Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam and Minority Leader Dr. Cassiel Ato Baah Forson has given an explanation for his party’s decision to stage a walkout during the approval of the President’s 24 Ministerial Nominees.

Before the Minority boycotted the House to approve the President’s nominees for Ministerial and Deputy Ministerial positions, Dr. Ato Forson told the House during a floor speech in Parliament that the Committee’s report was a majority decision because they were unable to approve the Nominees by consensus.

“All Members of the Minority Group voted en bloc against the Nominees,” he stated.

Dr Ato Forson restated that the Minority in Parliament voted against the Nominees not because they held anything against them; saying “No, we hold nothing against the Nominees. In fact, a good number of them are our colleagues and friends. But (the) decision to vote against them was motivated by Ghana first.”

According to Dr. Ato Forson, the minority voted against the nominees because the nation had experienced—and is still experiencing—a number of extremely difficult times, such as a dire economic crisis, food hunger, an overwhelming debt load from borrowing, and careless and wasteful spending.

“Ordinary Ghanaians continue to bite the bullet and businesses are struggling under high tax regime to contribute to the development of country. What is expected on the part of (the) Government would have been prudent management of these contributions from the people of Ghana,” Dr Ato Forson said.

“But hardly a day passes without one reckless and wasteful expenditure or the other by this government being uncovered.

“Mr Speaker, while (we) are happy for the Nominees because we know that it is just a matter of time and colleagues from our side will begin appearing before the Appointments Committee, we cannot pretend that things are still the same. Indeed, we cannot do things the same old way.”

Dr. Ato Forson emphasized that the current unfavorable state of affairs in Ghana, which the government has caused, necessitates not only bold, inventive, and creative approaches to overcoming obstacles, but also humility and selflessness on the part of the political elite.

He claimed that in such circumstances, the government in particular needed to show the Ghanaian people and the investment community that they were prepared and eager to back up their words in order to rebuild the necessary trust in the economy.

In such circumstances, he said, the government must demonstrate its sincere desire to raise Ghanaians’ standard of living.

Dr Ato Forson restated that it was impossible for those in authority to have no belt at all when the public was being asked to tighten their belts.

According to Dr. Ato Forson, it is also inconceivable that individuals in government, together with their friends and family, are chewing chocolate while the public is being urged to bite the bullet.

“Our side is deeply convinced that at this point in time, this Government must seize the opportunity to be creative, dynamic and think out of the box,” he said.

“Merely piling on numbers by way of appointment of ministers and deputy ministers does not signal to the people of Ghana that the President understands the seriousness of the mess that his government has created.”

According to the Minority Leader, atleast what President Akufo-Addo had to do is to at least reduce the size of the government.

Dr Ato stated that at a time when the government had obviously lost control of the economy and hardships, shrinkflation, and unemployment had become the norm, it did not seem like a very smart idea to add additional ministerial posts, which would just increase executive spending.

“Mr Speaker, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo must down-size his Government to signal to the people of Ghana that, at the very least, he is in tune with feedback and the challenges triggered by his government as a result of their bad economic policies,” Dr Ato Forson said.

The two major political parties, the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the NDC, at the very least, concur that the best course of action was to reduce, or right-size, the size of the government.