AG, Clerk Of Parliament, Sued Over Deputy Speakers’ Right To Vote

A court suit for interpretation regarding the rights of the Deputy Speakers of Parliament to vote while presiding in the absence of the substantive Speaker has been filed.

The suit, which was to be expected in the wake of the controversy over the 2022 budget and the stalemate over the e-levy, was filed at the Supreme Court by a private citizen, Mr. Suleman Adamu Sanid of Hydraform Estate, Spintex Road.

In the 12th January 2022 suit, Mr. Sanid invoked the original jurisdiction of the apex court and named the Attorney General as the first Defendant and the Clerk of Parliament as the second defendant.

Plaintiff asks the apex court to declare that the Speaker of Parliament is personified by a personage rather than the office so that in the 8th Parliament, only Rt. Hon. Alban Bagbin is the Speaker who carries the speakership with him when he is out of Parliament.

The nature of reliefs he seeks are, “a declaration that upon true and proper interpretation of Article 101 of the 1992 constitution of the Republic of Ghana, the Speaker, is one person who is different from any of the Deputy Speakers or any person presiding, and that a Deputy Speaker presiding during a parliamentary sitting does not assume the position of Speaker.”

Plaintiff also seeks a declaration that upon the true and proper interpretation of Article 104 (1) and (2) of the constitution, which among others state that the Speaker will have neither original nor casting votes do not apply to deputy speakers who are elected MPs.

The suit obviously seeks to get the apex court to make declarations that would favor the NPP majority Parliament whose government is facing stiff opposition from MPs of the Minority NDC, who have been opposed to several items in the 2022 budget, especially the unpopular e-levy.

The government seeks to tax mobile money and other banking services user through the e-levy, but the Minority makes it clear the tax would worsen the plight of an already over-taxed Ghanaian people.

The 8th Parliament is hung with both the NDC and the NPP having 137 MPs each even though an independent candidate for Fomena has pitched camp with the NPP.

Often the NPP’s simple majority is lost when the Speaker of Parliament is out of the legislative chamber and a deputy will have to preside in his place because the first Deputy is from the NPP side while the second deputy is the independent MP for Fomena.

There has since been controversy as to whether an MP who presides as Speaker in the absence of the Speaker should have vote casting right since the constitution makes it expressly clear that a presiding Speaker has no vote casting right. However, apart from the Speaker, every other person on the floor of Parliament is an elected representative of a constituency.

Meanwhile, the suit by Mr. Suleman Sanid is itself likely to spark constitutional questions as it has already been made clear by MPs, especially on the Minority side that as a matter of separation of powers, no other organ of state can instruct the Legislature on how to perform its functions.