According to a private legal practitioner, Nii Kpakpo Samoa Addo, the Majority Members in Parliament could have capitalized on it to call for his removal and for a by-election to be held in his constituency.

“It didn’t make political sense to push the issue because the consequences I understand could go as far as even calling for his removal from Parliament. Politically if you push, and your area is a flip flop constituency, the majority could take advantage and call for a by-election, they could actually expel you from Parliament,” he opined.

[contextly_sidebar id=”MXRJgsovQB4zPZ7Pskknx9S1NsQqAvgS”]The Bawku Central MP was charged with contempt for making unfounded bribery allegations against the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Joe Osei Owusu, the Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko and the Minority Chief Whip, Muntaka Mubarak.

A special committee, chaired by Joe Ghartey, the Essikado-Ketan MP was constituted by the Speaker of Parliament to investigate the matter.

The committee after its investigations concluded that Mr. Ayariga’s claim that Joe Osei Owusu was used as a conduit by the Minister for Energy to distribute a GH¢3,000 bribe to minority members on the Appointments Committee to facilitate Mr. Agyarko’s approval after his vetting was baseless and thus found him guilty of contempt of Parliament.

Although Ayariga openly disagreed with the report, he subsequently wrote a letter to the Speaker apologizing and he was pardoned.

Meanwhile, speaking on the Citi FM’s news analysis progamme, They Big Issue on Saturday, Nii Kpakpo who is also a member of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) explained that it was “politically risky” for Ayariga to have appealed the Joe Ghartey committee’s report.

This, the lawyer said was because there was no evidence backing his [Ayariga’s] claims.

“If you look at it from a political point of view…the committee was not only made up of NPP side but it was also made up of your own [NDC] members. Now members of the committee who were you own members came out to say that there was absolutely no evidence, and there was nothing on which they could evaluate and say the allegation was true. That means that you have no legs to stand on politically. If it was majority decision, then you could say that I my side support me but here is the case that your members were not on your side. It was virtually yourself and the whole Parliament. So I think, he took advice, weighed his options carefully and realized that this was not something that was worth pushing so let me take the honourable part by apologizing,” the lawyer added.

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By: Godwin Akweiteh Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @AlloteyGodwin

The post Ayariga could’ve been expelled from Parliament if… – Lawyer appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

This comes at a time when the committee was just about to wrap up on its investigations.

[contextly_sidebar id=”bhnnQoh4XQEwzpH2NkJ8xpdSqassmFYg”]The 5-member Committee was set up following allegations that the Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko, bribed some members of the Appointments Committee of parliament to facilitate his approval after appearing before it for vetting.

The second Deputy Majority Whip, Matthew Nyindam, who confirmed the development to Citi News, said although the deadline for the submission of the report was due, the Committee would still have to take the evidence of the interested party to prevent suspicion of bias.

“We met last week on a business issue and I raised that issue with the majority leader, and I asked him when this Joe Ghartey thing will be ready, because the public is interested, we are also interested as a house because it is an alleged issue and we all have to clear it. According to the leader, a member said he has some kind of evidence to tender in so they have to hold on for him to bring it so that it doesn’t look like somebody is fighting against the other.”

Matthew Nyindam, who remained tight-lipped on which MP had made the fresh application, said the report would be ready soon.

“It is true that the period given has expired, and I don’t recollect vividly that the speaker extended it, but the report is not ready. It is not illegal; there is no illegality in this. The only thing is that they would have gone to see the speaker for an extension of time and the speaker would have granted that,” he said.

Various civil society groups and individuals are mounting pressure on the committee to release the report on the matter which many say, has dented the image of the legislative body.

Dr. Rashid Raman, the Executive Director of the Africa Center for Parliamentary Affairs, has said that the longer the delay in the release of the report, the more likely Ghanainas will doubt the accuracy of the findings when eventually published.

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By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @jnyabor

The post Bribery scandal: Another MP to give fresh evidence appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.