The Member of Parliament (MP) for Okaikoi Central Patrick Boamah has accused President John Dramani Mahama of breaching the Security and Intelligence Act.
Section 17 of the 2002 Security and Intelligence Act indicates that (1) The President shall assign ministerial responsibility for the Intelligence Agencies to such Minister as the President shall consider appropriate.
(2) The Minister assigned responsibility under subsection (1) shall in respect of each year submit a report to Parliament on the Intelligence Agencies.
The MP however argues that though section 17 of the Act enjoins the President to perform the above stated roles, he has failed to do so.
“I am a Member of Parliament, I don’t know who the President has assigned those responsibilities to and it is a matter of grave concern to me..” the agitated MP complained.
“Parliamentarians cannot sit down for the Executive to do what pleases them.”
The MP believes his request for Article 17 of the Act to be followed to the letter will give the House an opportunity to scrutinize Ministers in-charge of all the intelligence agencies.
“The President has been in power for close to three years. There has been a lot of reports affecting certain officials within the intelligence agencies for which if annual reports were submitted to us we would have gleaned or read or scrutinised it and to be able to ask the Minister responsible for those institutions to come to Parliament to testify or for the Defence or Interior Committee to invite that Minister to come and answer questions.”
He posited the non compliance to the Act poses a major challenge to Ghana’s security especially since the nation is gearing up for elections in 2016.
“We don’t have such a Minister in place and it is a matter of grave concern. Going into an election year when people can easily parade themselves as national security operatives, BNI officials etc … is a matter that the President has to look at.”
The MP therefore asked the President to disclose who is in charge of these security operatives.
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By: Marian Efe Ansah/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @EfeAnsah