The former deputy Attorney General, Joseph Dindiok Kpemka has said Ghana, as a country, does not function with its Parliament as the supreme arm of the state.
According to Kpemka, although Parliament is a master of its own rules, the constitution remains the supreme document in Ghana, therefore any law that conflicts with the constitution must be nullified.
Speaking on Asaase Radio’s news analysis and current affairs programme, The Forum, on Saturday (12 March), Kpemka said, “we’re not running a country of parliamentary supremacy, that’s not what we are running in Ghana. We are running a country of constitutional supremacy and that’s very clear. So, when I heard some of the members of parliament talk about Parliament being master of its own rules, yes, that’s true.
“…But to the extent that those rules and regulations they enact do not conflict with any principle of the constitution, then they stand. But as soon as they conflict, then we invoke Article 12 of our constitution and declare them a nullity; that is the law.”
Kpemka added: “…So, when they said ‘we’re masters of our own procedure’ and et cetera, it is as though that is without limit. Or without caveats of ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’. The constitution itself is very clear that Parliament cannot make a law to say that Ghana is a one-party state even though general legislative power is given to them.”
Listen to Kpemka in the attached audio below:
You’re interfering in parliamentary affairs
The Minority Leader in Parliament, Haruna Iddrisu, has described the Supreme Court’s declaration that the two Deputy Speakers of Parliament can vote while presiding as a travesty of justice relating to parliamentary practice.
“Our attention has been drawn to a very disappointing ruling of the Supreme Court of Ghana which more or less amounts to a judicial interference in time-tested parliamentary practice and established conventions,” Iddrisu told journalists in Parliament on Wednesday (9 March).
“Everywhere in the world in civilised democracies, including the United Kingdom, the presiding officer’s vote is discounted, so it is not for nothing that Article 102 provides that a person presiding shall have no original nor casting vote.
“The Supreme Court to put it aptly, this ruling is judicial support for E-Levy, for a struggling economy in distress, and judicial support for the restoration of a matter they have said is constitutional, it is repugnant but what can we do. This is a travesty of parliamentary justice,” he declared.
Supreme Court not interfering in parliamentary affairs
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has said the decision by the Supreme Court on the voting rights of Deputy Speakers cannot amount to judicial inference in the work of Parliament.
According to Akufo-Addo, to suggest that Parliament is beyond the scrutiny of the Supreme Court is to imply that Parliament is a law unto itself.
“I’m not sure people who are saying this have actually taken the time to read the constitution of our country. It says so in black and white. The legislative power of the state, which is vested in Parliament, is subject to the provisions of the constitution,” the president said.
“All organs of the Ghanaian state – including me as the head of the executive – we are all subject to the teachings of the constitution.”
He continued, “There is nobody in the Ghanaian state that is above the fundamental law of the land. It will lead to the very matter that we have striven so long to avoid – the concentration of unregulated power in our state.
Nicholas Brown
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