[ 2021-02-05 ]

‘MPs with COVID-19 still attending Parliament’
Mr Joseph Osei-Owusu

The First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Joseph
Osei-Owusu, has disclosed that some Members of
Parliament (MPs) who have tested positive for
COVID-19 were still attending sittings of the
House.

He has subsequently threatened to publish the
names of the MPs if they continued to attend
business of the House.

Issuing the threat on the floor in Accra
yesterday, Mr Osei-Owusu, who was sitting in for
the Speaker, Mr Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin,
said the development put all MPs and staff of
Parliament at risk of contracting the respiratory
disease.

Mr Osei-Owusu, who is also New Patriotic Party
(NPP) MP for Bekwai, said “Mr Speaker wishes to
inform you that if those members do not withdraw
from attending sittings of the House, and isolate,
he would be forced to publish your names in order
to warn the rest of us.

“Please, let us take the protocol seriously and
let all members who have been informed of their
test results and have tested positive withdraw
from the precincts of Parliament and not only the
chamber.

“Stay home, self isolate, go through the
protocols and recover before you return to the
House”.

According to Mr Osei-Owusu, over 50 MPs were yet
to take their tests despite a constant reminder
that they should take the test.

This, he said, did not bode well for the image of
the House, considering the fact that testing had
been opened for over two weeks.

The Leader of the Majority Group, and NPP MP for
Suame, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, cautioned that
legislators, who have not subjected themselves to
the COVID-19 test, would not be allowed into the
House.

“From next week, members, who have not submitted
themselves to the test would not be permitted into
the chamber,” he emphasised.

Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu urged staff of the
Parliamentary Service and the 52 MPs who were yet
to take their test and journalists who operate at
Parliament to undertake the COVID-19 test “to
continue to enjoy the right of access to the
precincts of Parliament.”

The Minority Chief Whip of Parliament and National
Democratic Congress (NDC) MP for Asawase, Alhaji
Mohammed-Mubarak Muntaka, said the current
situation where results of COVID-19 test was given
to those who test positive did not auger well for
the fight against the pandemic.

As part of measures to control the spread of
COVID-19 in the House, the House has limited the
number of MPs who could be present at a particular
sitting to a third of the 275 lawmakers.

Ghana’s COVID-19 case count is on the increase
since the turn of the year as the second wave
continues to wreck a different dimension of havoc
on the country.

Source - Ghanaian Times

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