‘Who checks the buffoonery of Ghana’s Parliament?’

Wikipedia defines ‘buffoonery’ as a behaviour that is ridiculous but amusing.

Synonyms for ‘buffoonery’ include rowdiness, roughhouse, trickery, gamboling and mischief.

Thesaurus also says ‘ridiculous’ means; deserving or inviting derision or mockery.

According to Webster’s Dictionary, synonyms for ‘ridiculous’ include; irrational, illogical, outrageous, shocking, unbelievable and unthinkable.

Just recently, that is, before the eve of the 2021 Christmas, Ghana’s Parliamentary Service Board was reportedly airlifted to Dubai to hold their board meeting with the Speaker of Ghana’s Parliament because the Speaker was receiving medical care in Dubai.

Reportedly, members of the Parliamentary Service Board were airlifted back into Ghana at the expense of the Republic of Ghana.

So, in effect, their plane tickets, the hotel bills, ‘the per diems’ and ‘the boarding and lounging’ were all reportedly paid by the Government of the Republic of Ghana.

Media reports indicated that the Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu was also in Dubai receiving medical attention, together with the Rt. Honourable Speaker, Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, thus, probably influencing Ghana’s Parliamentary Service Board meeting to be held in Dubai at the expense of the poor Ghanaian tax payer.

But the question is: Is it very true that members of Ghana’s Parliamentary Service Board left the beautiful shores of the Republic of Ghana to hold its board meeting in Dubai?

Indeed, Ghana’s Parliamentary Service ought to issue a convincing statement clarifying the alleged Dubai Parliamentary Board meeting since the image of Parliament in respect of the alleged Dubai meeting is gradually but steadily , ‘getting close’ to the proverbial ‘Lavender Hill.’

Really, media reports have wrapped the image of Ghana’s Parliamentary Service Board into the ‘septic containers’, illegally queuing to off-load their ‘nose- breaking’ contents onto the ‘notorious’ ‘Lavender Hill.’

Readers, for now , I will not go into the ‘prognostics’ of the ‘Lavender Hill ‘  ‘palava’ and its ‘corrosive’ and ‘debilitating’ impact on its environment.

But the fact of the matter is that if an image is ‘buried’  in the bowels of ‘Lavender Hill’ in Ghana; it does not only speak ‘negative’ volumes about that image, but also ‘negative’  tonnes and tonnes of that image.

The Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Mr Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, however, asks this fundamental question: “If the board meeting couldn’t wait for the return of the Speaker and the Majority Leader from Dubai; because urgent matters had to be discussed, couldn’t the board meeting have been organised virtually, so that other members could participate from Ghana?”

He further queries:”It would be most disconcerting if it emerges that truly, there was no virtual component to this board meeting.”

The North Tongu Member of Parliament ‘fires on all cylinders’. He says:” We must admit that as an arm of government responsible for financial oversight, especially over the Executive, this doesn’t look great if confirmed, more so, when Parliament has been trying with much difficulty, in recent times to rein in an unhinged profligate Executive.”

Another critic of the government, veteran journalist Mr Kwesi Pratt, also says:”It is of great concern that , for Ghanaians appointed to serve the nation , they would fly all the way to Dubai just for a meeting about Ghana.”

According to hin, “even if it was a training programme that the board had gone for in Dubai, not for merely a meeting; does it explain anything that a training for the Parliamentary Service Board is done in Dubai?

“If the meeting was done at Abokobi, won’t it have been successful?”

Readers, it must be emphasised that media reports about the alleged Parliamentary Service Board meeting in Dubai cast a ‘huge slur’ on the already tattered image of Parliament.

Some critics say:”If parliamentarians are not misconducting themselves on the floor of Parliament; by trading blows; disfiguring the faces of their opponents with knives and razor blades; then they are stealing our money, via their huge salaries and their ex-gratia.”

Others also claim that:”Parliament has taken Ghanaians for granted, so they spend the nation’s money without thinking properly,” contending that, “look at how the ‘double-salary issue in Parliament’ was handled harphazardly by the state.

“And with many good companies into carpentry in Ghana, Parliament at a time in its life had to rush to China to import tables and chairs for use in that ‘August House’. Oh! mother Ghana!!! 

“And now, look at a mere meeting of the Parliamentary Service Board taken out of the jurisdiction of the Republic of Ghana in the unholy name of profligacy.”

Others also ask in ‘loud silence’: “Who checks the ‘buffoonery’ of Ghana’s Parliament?”

 Contact email/WhatsApp of the author:

asmahfrankg@gmail.com (0505556179)