The General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party, John Boadu, has revealed that the NPP side of Parliament has proposed that Professor Aaron Mike Oquaye be maintained as Speaker in the 8th Parliament of Ghana.
According to Mr Boadu, this decision assented to by President-elect Akufo-Addo and the Party’s Council, is out of the need to maintain consistency in Parliament in view of the current numbers.
“We need to have somebody that will not create any friction or whatsoever. We have seen some before in the year 2004, we had a situation where our speaker has changed and the brouhaha that went with it was not okay,” John Boadu told JoyNews’ Latif Iddrisu.
His comments come after the question of who the next Speaker of Parliament will be has dominated news headlines in the country.
Names like Justice Dotse and Ayikoi Otoo have been rumoured as a possible replacement for Prof Mike Ocquaye.
However, John Boadu disclosed that the President, as the de facto Head of the Party, prefers to maintain Prof Mike Oquaye as Speaker of Parliament for “continuity.”
The party is also making changes to some of its leadership in Parliament, Although it is maintaining Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu as the Majority Leader, MP-elect for Effutu, Alex Afenyo Markin will serve as the Deputy.
In addition, MP-elect for Nsawam-Adoagyiri, Frank Annoh-Dompreh will be the Party’s Chief Whip while the MP-elect for Ayawaso West Wuogon and MP for Tolon Constituency serve as his deputies.
Earlier, the Chairman of the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC), Professor Stephen Adei advised the NPP against changing the Speaker of Parliament.
According to him, there is too much ‘turbulence’ at this time for the NPP bring in a new Speaker of Parliament.
