The Minority in Parliament has filed a motion seeking to remove the Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, from office, over his involvement in the botched Sputnik -V Coronavirus vaccine purchase.
The decision of the Minority follows the adoption of the report of the five-member Adhoc Committee of the House, constituted to probe the deal in July, last year.
According to the report, which was debated in August 2021, Mr Agyeman-Manu, MP for Dormaa Central, breached the public procurement guidelines and constitutional requirements when he entered Ghana into the deal with Emirati businessman, Sheikh Ahmed Dalmook Al Maktoum, for the supply and purchase of 3.4 million doses of the Russia made vaccine.
Mr Agyeman-Manu said at the Alexander Afenyo-Markin-led Committee sitting that he “made that error because of my frustrations but upon hindsight, it won’t happen again. Those were not normal times. I was in a situation that couldn’t make me think normal like you are doing now.”
Speaking to the journalists yesterday, Ranking Member on the Adhoc and Health Committees, KwabenaMintahAkandoh, said the minister ought to be removed from office for breaching the Constitution and the Public Procurement Act.
Mr Akandoh said the decision of the Minority seeking the minister’s removal through a parliamentary vote of censure, was because President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has not shown any commitment to ensure the laws of the country were respected.
“All this while, we thought that the president would have done the needful, but from all indications it looks as though the President hasn’t heard or seen what his appointee has done and therefore. We as Members of Parliament on the Minority side by Article 82 of the Constitution, have filed a motion and have the required signatories to pass a vote of censure to remove the minister from office”, Mr Akandoh said.
He said that all 137 Members of the Minority have signed the motion and expressed the confidence that their colleagues in the Majority would vote in favour of the motion, which would require two-thirds of all members voting to remove the Minister in line with Article 82(1) of the constitution.
But, the Majority indicated that the House must move on having adopted the report by consensus.
In the view of the Deputy Majority Leader and MP for Effutu, Alexander Afenyo-Markin, “the Committee has held the minister’s leg to the fire of accountability and that “no financial loss was occasioned.”
“To me, to the extent that through our work, certain correspondence between the Ministry and Sheik Al Maktoum resulted in the refund of certain amounts for which no vaccines have been received is enough for us to celebrate as a country that when Parliament works together in a bipartisan manner we can achieve results,” Mr Afenyo-Markin, who chaired the Adhoc Committee, told journalists.
He said that would be in bad faith considering the fact that both parties have worked cordially in the Sputnik-V saga.
Mr Afenyo-Markin said “We would be surprised to see that happen on the floor of the House because it will amount to serious bad faith but we wait and see.”
BY JULIUS YAO PETETSI
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