A former Attorney General and Member of Parliament (MP) for Sekondi, Papa Owusu Ankomah has said that the Speaker of Parliament, Edward Doe Adjaho’s decision not to be sworn-in as acting President can only be overturned by the Supreme Court.
The Speaker has on two occasions refused to take the constitutionally mandated oath of presidency in the absence of both President Mahama and his vice, Kwesi Amissah-Arthur.
The decision has attracted varied opinions from legal minds, including a private legal practitioner, Kwame Akuffo who described the Speaker’s decision as “completely absurd.”
[contextly_sidebar id=”UyQMHArkNEG0PbrzuJ74EPcfcC0UmSbl”]But the former Attorney General argued that the speaker’s decision is now law.
Owusu Ankomah opined that “when the Speaker and Chief Justice consult and the Speaker takes a decision; for me for purposes of Parliament, what the speaker says is the law so…unless and until the Supreme Court decides otherwise.”
He told Citi News that the framers of the Constitution did not anticipate that such instances could happen in the country hence the seeming confusion over the issue.
He said “the Constitution certainly did not anticipate that the speaker will take an oath and it will be for the period of the administration of the President. It’s only for a period that the President and Vice President at a particular time are unable to perform the functions of the office of the President.”
The Sekondi MP also explained that the speaker’s oath of office is different from that of the President and the Vice President adding that “they take an oath for the period of the administration; [but] the Speaker takes an oath for that particular period that he is acting as President in the absence of the President and Vice President.”
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By: Godwin Allotey Akweiteh/citifmonline.com/Ghana