Debates of 21 Oct 2010

Hon Members, Correction of Votes and Proceedings and the Official Report.
Correction of Votes and Proceedings of Wednesday, 20th October, 2010.

Hon Members , the Votes and

Proceedings of Wednesday, 20th October, 2010, is deemed as the true record of proceedings.

Hon Members, the Official Report of

Tuesday -

Mr
Speaker, I am a bit confused; if I could be guided on the chronology of events yesterday. I thought immediately you entered, before Prayers were said, the communication relating to the absence of the Speaker was made before you said the Prayers. But it looks like, here, it has been recorded that Prayers were read and then the communication was done. I am not too sure. That is why I said I needed your guidance.

I
think in terms of chronology, you are right. But the Table Office is telling me that that is their style. In terms of

chronology, the announcement was made, the communication was read before the Prayers. You are absolutely right but -

Mr Speaker,
it cannot be a style. If the style is wrong, it must be pointed out. This is because you read the Prayers in your capacity as the acting Speaker and you could not have done that before the communication. So that should be the order.

Mr Speaker,
I was just thinking that we could find a middle way. If you look at page 6 of the Votes and Proceedings, it should read as follows:
“A Clerk-at-the-Table, Mr Ebenezer Ahumah Djietror informed the House of the absence of the Rt. Hon Speaker, before prayers, to attend….”
And I think it solves the problem. You just state it at where it is now but put comma before Prayers.

Very well.

Hon Members, correction of the Official

Report of Tuesday, 19th October, 2010.

Hon Members, in the absence of any correction, the Official Report of Tuesday, 19th October, 2010 is hereby adopted as the true record of proceedings.

Hon Members, we will, for now, by

virtue of Standing Order 53(2), move to the Commencement of Public Business and see whether we can take some Statements.

Mr Speaker, the Hon Minister for Finance and Economic Planning asked for permission

Mr Speaker, may I crave your indulgence to seek permission for the Hon Deputy Minister for Finance and Economic Planning to lay the Paper on his behalf.

Mr Speaker, we, certainly,
in principle, have no objection to that. It is just to make a comment that we thought that we should continue the practice of Leadership informing each other before this public announcement. However, we accept that.

Very well.
By the Deputy Minister for Finance and Economic Planning (Mr Seth Terkpeh) (on behalf of the Minister) for Finance and Economic Planning
Loan Fac i l i ty be tween the Government of Ghana and the Government of Austria through Unicredit Bank AG (Bank Austria Creditanstalt AG) for an amount of €7,980,000.00 for the construction and equipping of five polyclinics in the Upper West Region.
Referred to the Committee on Finance .
By the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources -
Annual Report of the Lands Commission for the year 2009.
Referred to the Committee on Lands and Forestry.

Hon
Members, I have admitted one Statement standing in the name of the Hon Member for Asante Akim South, Mrs Gifty Ohene- Konadu.

Hon
Member, you have the floor.

Mr Speaker,
they are disorganising me. [Laughter.] Well, the Minister for Local Government and Rural Development is not here - [An Hon Member: Read your Statement.]
Mr Speaker, it is often said that local government is the sphere of government closest to the people. Again, it is argued that local government is not only close to the “people”, but that its impact is most immediately felt on the lives of women. Women are also considered the primary consumers of local government services due to their gender roles. If basic services such as water or electricity are absent, the workload of women, including their social roles of caring for the family and the community at large is intensified.

Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker, I wish to associate myself with the Statement made by Hon Gifty Ohene-Konadu and the timely nature of the Statement, given the fact that we are preparing for District Assembly Elections before the close of the year.
Mr Speaker, there has been a lot of
lip- service on women representation at decision-making bodies in the country. Day in, day out, we as politicians, whether the Executive or Legislature, the media, civil society organisations, have all at the public fora made pronouncements to encourage more women to participate in decision-making processes of this country. However, I would say that there has not been much commitment to that cause. It is more or less like the “in thing”. It is something you say that is right but what do we do about it?
I believe that this is the time, as we prepare for the local government elections for us to really walk the talk. In other words, I am encouraging our Hon Members within their communities to encourage more women to come forward and also even contribute to their campaigns so that more women would win the elections at the local level and therefore, come to the District Assembly.
Mr Speaker, even as we embark on constitutional review, I would like us to re- look at our representational provisions in the Constitution, be it local government or at the national level, for us to re-examine the difficulties that women have in putting themselves up, particularly for even as Members of Parliament, and make some amendments in our Constitution, such that there would be compulsorily, seats that are reserved for the good women and the caring women of Ghana.
At the local level, you would see that all those who have both men and women Assembly persons would notice that the women typically are very very serviceable. They carry their caring home duties to
the communities -- [Interruptions.] Mr Speaker, I will not be detracted by some suggestive statements of others - [Interruptions.]

Hon Members, let us listen to the Hon Member on the floor.

But let me say this with all seriousness that when you have a female Assembly person and a male Assembly person, a female and a male, invariably - [Interruption] I am not generalising -- but my observation is that the women tend to carry their caring attitude, their compassion, their sense of commitment to the good of people into the community. So, the community tends to benefit more from women Assembly persons.
So, as we think of this Assembly elections coming, I am urging all Hon Members, that as a criterion for seeing your commitment to gender equality, let us see that you have made some active contributions to the women who bring themselves up for elections. Let us even look at how many constituencies have more women candidates or more women elected so that we can also use that as a measure of our commitment to the cause.
On this note, I would congratulate the Hon Member who made the Statement and say that the timeliness of it is such that we would want to see Hon Members also demonstrate by walking the talk by supporting more women for elections at the constituency level.

Mr Speaker, I would also want to commend the Hon Member for making this very important Statement and also at this particular time.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to contribute to the Statement made by the Hon Member for Asante Akim South (Ms Gifty Ohene- Konadu) on the topic, Local Government: a Strategic Site of Struggle for Gender Equity.
Mr Speaker, I would want to stretch this to the area of development and say, with all the authority at my disposal, that women are prime agents for development. When I look at my Colleague females in Parliament, I can say that each one of us is working very, very hard to make sure that she makes a difference in the constituency and in the society in which we come from. This is not to say that the men are not working but I am singling out the women and commending them for the hard work they are doing.
Mr Speaker, I also want to restrict this to the women in political development. If you even look at the constituency level, the most active agents are women. They
gather at the rallies, they do the running around, they make sure that the youth in the area are sensitised politically to contribute their quota to the political process.
When it comes to political tolerance, I believe the threshold of women needs to be commended. All the insults flying round in the political arena are being perpetrated by men. We do not have any woman - [Interruptions]-- and before the Hon Minister for Youth and Sports leaves - I wish to commend her and the Hon Attorney-General and Minister for Justice for Sitting in to make sure that when their Papers were laid, they were physically present - [Hear! Hear!]
I have noticed that most of the time, male Colleague Hon Ministers of theirs are not here. For instance, the day that we resumed Parliament, the Hon Minister for Energy and the Hon Minister for Local Government and Rural Development were not here when their Papers were laid. And I believe the women need to be commended -- It had to take the Hon Minister for Information to do the process for them.
Mr Speaker, I believe women diligently carry out their duties in the society, be it in the political arena, be it in the homes, be it at the educational level, et cetera. When the men are busy insulting people in the society, you have women gathering to pray that the country becomes a better place to live in.

Hon Member, please, sit down, a woman is talking; an able woman is talking. Please, sit down
Mr Speaker, one thing that also beats my mind is that when we have in the society rape cases, sexual harassment
- you do not hear about women; it is only the males doing these things. Why am I saying this? I am charging all of us women - Hon Fritz Baffour, why have you opened your mouth? Are you shocked? It is true.
Mr Speaker, I want to encourage our women that they are doing well and they need to be commended. They should come out boldly to stand for the District Assembly Elections and they will be elected by their colleague women as well as the men who have the gender equity process at heart. They should also come to Parliament and contribute their quota to society. They should also be elected to sit at high places of decision-making.

It is done.

It is done, how? How many women do you have?

Hon Member for Bantama, address the Chair.

Mr Speaker, I believe all these comments go to show that women need to come out boldly, all women should come on board to boldly come and join us to fight for a beautiful and prosperous Ghana.
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to contribute to the Statement.
Alhaj i Muhammed-Mubarak Muntaka (NDC - Asawase): Mr Speaker, I rise to support the Hon Member who made the Statement and to say that this

Hon Member, do you know the implication of that statement? You would be losing your seat next time - [Laughter.]

Mr Speaker, if Asawase can get a woman that the population think can perform better than me -- we want the best. Honestly, as I stand here, I cannot portray myself as the best person for Asawase. If the people from Asawase think that a woman can do better than me, they should be able to support her. I think with your constituency and any other constituency-- it is not about my constituency. We want the best for our country and they should be able to change their perceptions about each other so that they can begin to support each other, especially those who have the capacity to be able to perform. Mr Speaker, if you look at -

Hon Member, can you kindly wind up?

With the greatest respect to our mothers, Mr Speaker, some of them also, when given the opportunity, you look at the way they conduct themselves, their drawback attitude also discourage, other women.
I would end by saying, Mr Speaker, that the politicking in our country must also change. The tendency to destroy each other-- women do not have the capacity to be able to stand this.
I would want to urge that our media, especially should do us all good-- when things that will not put food on our table are being heightened, things that will not unite us are the things that they always portray; they scare competent women from taking up the mantle to also contest.
With these Mr Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity.

Hon Member, I will take two more from both sides, two brief comments from both sides and that brings us --

Hon Deputy Minority Leader, you will be the last to speak from your side, that is why I am not calling you; I have recognised you all along but -- The Hon Member for Amenfi East, Mr J. B. Aidoo.

Mr Speaker, this is a very important Statement. The Statement talks about local governance and gender equity. Mr Speaker, it is also important because of the timing. We are about to have the District Assembly Elections as well as the Unit Committee Elections. If you look at the unit committees structure as of now, it has been restricted to five membership.
Mr Speaker, when it was even 15 membership, we hardly had any woman representation on the unit committees. Now that the number has been reduced to

Hon
Members, the background noise is becoming too much.

If the traditional way of getting our women to local government, that is the District Assembly and then the unit committee levels cannot be achieved through election, then the State should take steps as has been recommended by the Constitution to ensure that we get

a fair representation of appointees or if possible recruited women into the District Assembly and also at the unit committee levels.

So Mr Speaker, I will just appeal to the Hon Minister for Local Government and Rural Development to look at this provision of the Constitution carefully and also to appeal to this House for us to take a closer look at these provisions; they are very, very critical if we are to get our womenfolk into the local government governance.

Thank you for this.

Thank you Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to contribute to the Statement made by the Hon Ranking Member. Mr Speaker, let me also say that this is a very important Statement which has come at the right time, because as a nation, very soon, we will go into elections to elect our various local representatives to the various District Assemblies.
Mr Speaker, we have two components of members at the various District Assemblies. We have the elected ones and then appointed ones. I want to concentrate on the appointees and urge the Hon Minister for Local Government and Rural Development that it should be mandatory for all various District Assemblies that after the elections, all the various appointees, at least, 50 per cent should be women. When you go to the various District Assemblies, you realize that more than 90 per cent of the appointees to the Assembly are men.
If our women are unable to contest and compete with the men, I think there is another avenue where we can encourage our women to show keen interest in participating in our local administration. So I want to call on the Ministry of Local
Government and Rural Development to show keen interest in ensuring that all the various Assemblies appoint at least, 50 per cent of the appointees to the various District Assemblies, women so that we can have more women to participate in local government.
Mr Speaker, let me also call on civil society and various non-governmental organizations (NGOs) which will be assisting those people who are contesting this year's elections to the District Assemblies to support the women who have come out boldly to contest in this upcoming District Assembly Elections. They should channel all their resources, both cash and in kind to assisting them so that those who willingly want to participate at the local administration level would be assisted to achieve their objectives.
Mr Speaker, when we do this, then we would be supporting our women, even though, as it stands at the moment, there is a cry of imbalance so far as political leadership in the country is concerned. If we are able to do some of these things, we would be encouraging more and more women to show interest in participating in both national and local elections.
I thank you very much for the opportunity, Mr Speaker.

Thank you Mr Speaker, for the opportunity. Mr Speaker, I wish to thank Hon Gifty Ohene-Konadu for making this Statement.
Mr Speaker, I want to start by reminding all of us in this Parliament that we have assisted through our processes the ratification of the Charter on democracy, Elections and Governance.
We in this House have unanimously approved the ratification and accordingly, Ghana is the seventh country or member State to ratify the Charter on Democracy and Governance. Which means, when the target of 15 is achieved, the Charter will become effective and the blue print for Africa moving forward.
Mr Speaker, the Charter talks about gender parity at all levels and having ratified that Charter, it is now left to us to domesticate the concepts in there. Therefore, I would propose straightaway that we legislate on parity of representation at the various levels because of the challenges that we face in our present political arrangement of achieving equity or whatever.
Now, it is parity; it means that we need to have at least, 50-50 representation at the various levels. If through elections, it is not going to be achieved, we can achieve that by other means.
Mr Speaker, Rwanda has achieved that level of parity in Parliament. If one looks at Chapter 6 -- Directive Principles of State Policy, article 35 (5) also prohibits discrimination based on a number of issues including gender. And if you look at article 35 (6) (b), it states that the State should take appropriate steps to try to achieve reasonable regional gender balance in public positions.
Now, it has been raised, not just as a guide but by our ratification of that Charter, it should now become possible for us to pass laws in this country to ensure that we achieve that. Are we going to do so by creating special seats for women? That is left to us to discuss. But we are no more going to be allowed to pay lip-service to the concept or idea of equality or equity or whatever because clearly, we have ratified it and we should now walk the talk.
So, I would propose that, we do -- whether we are asking that per constituency, we are going to have a seat that would only be contested for -- a

place contested for by women; we need to do that. But right now, we have the problem of the District Assembly and the challenges are even greater there. There, it is not based on Party, so you cannot even ask the Parties to ensure that we have gender parity. Once it is non-partisan, it becomes more fluid and individuals who want to stand for office would be allowed to campaign.
So how do we do it? Yes, as Members of Parliament, we might want to get suitable candidates who are ladies or women and try to finance them. But I do not know how successful that would be.
Mr Speaker, His Excellency the President has promised 40 per cent and we know that he has not been able to achieve that because of the conditions that we have in this country. So let us legislate on it and ensure that at the various levels, we have that.
Even the 30 per cent appointees that we have, we have not been able to achieve any gender parity there because you go and consult the traditional authorities or various interest groups and, the people they propose, most of the time are men. But I think that we need to consciously work at it and let us legislate on it and that is the only way we can achieve that. It would be right to do so, Mr Speaker, because women are the majority and strictly speaking, how can we have a system that does not represent the Majority? So we have to look at it in that way.

There is also the issue of the fact that women play a very important role in our day-to-day lives and the economic development of a country. Mr Speaker, I am one of those who believe that -- if we look at the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) -- if we achieve Goal 3,

which is on the empowerment of women, it would be easy for us to achieve the other goals and I am not the first to say that.

I am sure the illustrious son of Ghana, Dr Kwegyir Aggrey, has said it long time ago, that when you educate a man, you educate an individual but when you educate a woman, you educate a nation. And I believe that - [Interruption.] Today is his birthday? I have just been told that today is his birthday. If that is the case, I think that it is just opportune that we are - [Interruption] - 135th Birthday of Dr Aggrey. And I do not know why it is taking us so long in Ghana to respond to that saying.

Indeed, when we go to the Pan -African Parliament now, we sit down and Rwanda has overtaken us in that direction. Senegal has also passed a law to achieve that. I think it is now time for us to work on a legislation to enforce parity of gender representation at various levels and if we do so, I am sure we would receive a lot of results.

Mr Speaker, I can speak of an

experience when I was privileged to be Regional Minister for the Upper West Region, where we sought to bring down the under-five mortality which was in 2005, 208 per 1,000 live births to 104 per 1,000 live births by December 2008 and we targeted the women. We made the women central to the programmes. So we got United Nations Children's Education Fund (UNICEF) which assisted with US $1.6 million and Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA), which assisted us with US $1.4 million.

We were able to bring it down -- even though I left the region but it came down from 208 to 113 by December. I say so because most of the times, when you are talking of under-five mortality and maternal mortality, women are central but if you go to meetings on these subjects,

you would find out that women are barely represented. So when we made women central, we made traditional birth attendants the centre of it, and we worked on it and we got results.

So I can vouch that when we do empower our women, when we do ensure parity at the various levels, the development of Ghana would be faster and easier.

I would like to again thank the Hon Member who made the Statement but now to say that we need to move towards legislation to ensure gender parity at the various levels in this country.

I thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr Abdul-Rashid Pelpuo (NDC

- Wa Central): Mr Speaker, I would like to also thank the Hon Member who made the Statement for bringing up this issue about gender and our decentralized systems of election in which we want to see women participate at that low level of decision- making effectively to ensure that development takes place at the lower levels with the inclusion of all sexes and all our disadvantaged groups in the society.

Mr Speaker, there is often an erroneous

impression that any time we talk about gender, we are talking about women. It is also about advocating equity; about the disadvantaged in society; about children; about the weak; about the poor and ensuring that all these people are brought in line to ensure that in the course of development, they are not left behind; and in the course of development, they are given a role to play; and that in the course of decision-making, they have a say in the final output in what we want the country to look like.

Mr Speaker, the advocacy has always

been to say that we should be affirmative

in taking a decision about law-making and that we should ensure that in that affirmative action, we pass laws to ensure women representation is equal to men. It is a very sensitive area and in my view, I think that we either have to take a decision -- either to say we permanently consign the woman to the second place and we will make a law to bring her up or we take a firm decision to ensure that in all the things we do, in educating them, in human resource development, in promoting them and all aspects of our lives, we allow them to compete equally with men. This is because we would have strengthened and empowered them, rather than to say, “Let us leave them at the background there; let us ensure that they are not developed to the extent that they can compete and let us make laws to protect them.”

Mr Speaker, that might not be accurate. I may be contradicting myself if I say so but it is important for us to take note that in advocating for women, the most critical issue about it is to ensure that in the provision of education, in the provision of job opportunities, we see them as equal partners and we grade them because of their capacity and capabilities rather than the sex.

If we are able to do that we would strengthen them to stand up in election time to compete, to be able to finance their own elections and to contest elections and win elections. Many of our gallant women who are sitting here today have done that; they beat men at primaries and they are capable because they have the wherewithal; they have good education and they have good capacity to analyse the system and to be able to produce results.

Mr Speaker, in terms of our decision-

making at the lower levels, I believe strongly that the woman has a role to play because women take care of the

Thank
you very much.
That brings us to the end of the Statement.
Hon Members, I have received a
Statement and there are also indications from some Hon Members to make Statements on the African Magazine, 2010 Political Performance Index. I am in consultation with the Leadership of the House to see how this matter can be handled and when that consultation is completed, the House would accordingly be informed. So until then, the Statement
will be with me and when the consultation is concluded, we will inform the House the way forward.

Mr Speaker, before you invite the Deputy Majority Leader for directions, I want to raise an issue in respect of the Instruments that were purportedly laid on 19th October 2010. They are first, the Local Government (Creation of new District Electoral Areas) Instrument, 2010 and the Unit Committee Regulations, 2010 (C. I. 18).
Mr Speaker, I am constrained to make this point at this stage because of the implications of the purported laying that was done on that day. I recall that the Minority Leader raised an issue whether Standing Order 75 (1) was complied with, namely, that there were sufficient copies to go round and we were told that was the case. As it has turned out now, as of yesterday, we had no copies served on Hon Members and today, as I speak to you, Hon Members have not been given copies.
Mr Speaker, it is not just being difficult of whatever people might say, but there are very serious legal implications of the laying which we can see at Standing Order 77.
Mr Speaker, Standing Order 77 (1) talks about -
“Any Orders or Regulations made by any person or authority pursuant to a power conferred in that behalf by the Constitution or any other law,
(a) shall be laid before Parliament;
(b)shall be published in the Gazette on the day when they are so laid before Parliament; and
(c) shall come into force at the expiration of a period of twenty-one Sitting days of being so laid unless
Par l iament , before the expiration of the said period of twenty-one Sitting days, annuls any such Orders, Rules or Regulations by the votes of not less than two-thirds of all the Members of Parliament.”
Mr Speaker, so, once it has been laid, except that it is annulled by two-thirds, after twenty-one Sitting days, it becomes law. We cannot, therefore, joke with our obligation under this law. And since the 19th of October, we have not been served. I want us to take note that time cannot run. Time cannot run. If we say that time is running, why is it running? Because we have not been given the opportunity to even acquaint ourselves with what is in there.
And there is no guarantee when this will be provided and these are very, very important Instruments which go directly to the democratic arrangement at the district level -- local government level and I think that it is a very serious matter. So, I would like to draw your attention to this that we do not just pay for lip-service to Standing Order 77 for the serious consequences that the act of laying has on the situation in this country. I am of the view and I strongly propose before you, Mr Speaker, that the twenty-one days cannot run until copies have been served on Hon Members of Parliament.
Mr Pelpuo -rose—

Do you want to respond? Hon Deputy Majority Leader, this matter was raised yesterday by the Hon Minority Chief Whip. The information that was made available to me was to the effect that the Papers were being run and if it is true, as it is being stated by the Hon Deputy Minority Leader, that they are not ready, then his concerns are very legitimate. But let Leadership meet on this matter because the implications

are obvious. We will not for now make a determination whether the time has started running on the 19th or not. But let Leadership meet on this matter and let us see how we can resolve this issue.

Mr
Speaker, I totally agree with what you are saying. Normally, in determining boundaries of districts and in the electoral areas, they arouse a lot of passion. And normally, when we have come to consider them, some massaging has often been done and to that extent, we try to be very engaging such that these things are not sent back to the relevant authorities for them to effect corrections before they come here.
If we have to resort to that mechanism, then it is important that they come early enough so that these things are done and the rough edges are smoothened out, otherwise, they could cause problems. Already, the Assemblies tenure end on the 29th or so of this month and there is going to be a period of vacuum. It is not anticipated that the Assemblies are run on day-to-day basis by one or two people; in this case, the District Chief Executives and the Presiding Members. That is not the anticipation. Whatever happens during this transition would be more of an aberration than the usual, which is why we need to act with some dispatch on this.
So, let me entreat the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development to come out rapidly on this so that we can attend to the details and not wait until the last minute when we would see that we have not been able to fashion out compromises here and there, such that the whole exercise is thrown into disarray. So, let the Ministry be more up and doing than they have done, so that we arrive at the scheduled point, whole and very clear in our minds that we have done the right thing.

Mr
Speaker, I just want to agree very much with my Hon Colleagues because it is important that when these Papers are laid, they are also distributed to all Hon Members, so we can have our input and do what we are supposed to do, for which

Before I
call on the Minority to second the Motion, I still want to meet the Leadership in the Speaker's Lobby after adjournment on this matter that was raised by the Hon Deputy Minority Leader. I have been informed that the ad hoc committee on the Review of the 1992 Constitution will be meeting immediately after adjournment in the Speaker's Conference Room. So members of the Committee should endeavour to attend the meeting.

Mr
Speaker, I beg to second the Motion moved by the Deputy Majority Leader for adjournment. In doing so, I want to comment that I note that the Deputy Majority Leader is confirming our fears that indeed, the Papers were not ready before they were laid. He just confirmed that he is working very hard round the corner and then corrected to round the clock with the Ministry. I thought once the Papers were already in Parliament, he will be working around the clock with the Table Office or the Clerk's Office to make sure that we get the Papers.
Now that he is confirming he is working with the Ministry, maybe, when Leadership meets, we have to reconsider the issue of the Papers having been laid.
I beg to second his Motion.
Thank you.
Question put and Motion agreed to.