Minority Chief Whip and Member of Parliament (MP) for Asawase, Alhaji Mohammed-Mubarak Muntaka, Tuesday, told Parliament that under no circumstances can any of the Members shy away from telling the truth about he or she won the Parliamentary elections to become an MP.
He said while in opposition, the only way out for one to unseat a sitting MP is to undermine him and tell the electorates lies to win their votes.
Without these, he said, it would be very difficult for one to come to Parliament as a lawmaker.
However, he said all these things are done because the populace or constituents lack the understanding of the work or duties of an MP.
Contributing to a statement delivered on the floor of Parliament by Dr. Emmanuel Marfo over ‘Assessing the performance of Members of Parliament: A time to own the process’; Muntaka said it was about time MPs and political parties tell the truth to the constituents about the responsibilities of a lawmaker.
Dr. Marfo in his statement drew the House’s attention to some research done by some institutions and organizations about the performance of Members and the need for all to have an interest in those kinds of work.
He referred a recent study published by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) where the study observed that majority of the respondents rated the performance of their MPs low to average.
For instance, he said many of such studies discount the enormous time used by MPs to follow up on projects, school admissions, job applications, committee sittings and other public interest assignments such as services on boards as well intellectual contributions deployed during those assignments.
The study, he noted, further revealed that almost 50% of respondents who contacted their MPs did so to discuss developmental issues and some 40% to seek various forms of assistance, including financial assistance. That means less than 10% actually contacted their MPs on questions of legislation or oversight functions.
“So, clearly, how can one expect a high rating of MPs performance under circumstances where we know MPs do not have unlimited resources to meet the various financial requests from constituents and to meet the high cost of development needs in our constituents. We continue to be confronted with requests to construct roads, bridges, drains and to renovate schools and so on. So, Mr. Speaker, there seem to be some misconception here and the time to confront such mass ignorance is now; otherwise we will continue to be viewed in a negative way by the public,” he noted.
But Muntaka speaking further on the issue said the blame should be placed at the door steps of the MPs for telling the constituents lies and undermining their predecessors to win elections.
“We got here by undermining those who were here and telling lies that when we come, we are going to do this and we will give you this and that. How many of us are sitting in this chamber as we speak now that somebody is not already in your constituency going round telling lies that he can provide this and that and he is dashing money to influence people.
What are the political parties doing?”
“The political parties have a great role to play because if you can have with the greatest respect, MPs that have stayed here over a decade and have acquired a lot of experience, just like my colleague from Old Tafo, as he stated and how to even run this House and even the government, others are already in his constituency and telling the people that oh when I come I can do this and they are dashing out little little money. Then when you get here you now see the reality. You the one who has undermined others to come you are already calling that there should be sanity when you yourself abused the system by telling lies and telling the people that you knew very well the mandate of the MP and the constitution, yet you go around and saying all manner of things just to undermine the MP and when you come you say that let’s find a way … – yes I agree we must find a way of stopping and sanitizing the system but the political parties must be up and doing because the political parties need to look at their constitution.”
Yes, we undermine and tell lies to win elections – Muntaka confesses
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