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Parliament can’t compel EC to adopt Guarantor system – Yaw Baah
A constitutional lawyer and a former Member of Parliament for Kumawu, Yaw Baah, has criticised the procedure used by Parliament to ensure that the guarantor system becomes one of the means through which a Ghanaian can register to vote.
According to him, the legislative body cannot compel the Electoral Commission (EC) to include the guarantor system in the constitutional instrument (CI) for continuous voter registration which the electoral body seeks to lay before the House.
At best, he said the decision by Parliament for the EC to include the guarantor system in the C.I was a recommendation which the electoral management body was not bound by any law to follow.
“If Parliament insists that its decision for the EC to include the guarantor system is binding, then the exercise it undertook on March 31by voting to recommend to the EC to include the guarantor system is unconstitutional. The recommendation is an opinion by Parliament,” he said.
Mr Baah premised his argument on Article 11(7) of the 1992 Constitution, the constitutional provision on subsidiary legislations, and the Supreme Court decision in Nii Tetteh Opremreh v EC and A-G, which interprets and enforce the said provision.
In that particular case, he said, the Supreme Court speaking through Justice Sulemana Gbadegbe, clearly distinguished between Article 11 (7), which restricts Parliament powers with regard to subsidiary legislation, and Article 106(6) of the constitution which gave Parliament the power to amend any substantive legislation.
Annulment
In an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic, Mr Baah who is a former Chairman of the Legal, Constitutional and Parliamentary Affairs Committee of Parliament, said Parliament, per Article 11(7) of the 1992 Constitution, had the power to only annul subsidiary legislations which includes CIs.
Recommendation by Parliament in respect of subsidiary legislations, he said, were only persuasive but not binding on the entity sponsoring the legislations.
In line with Article 11 (7) of the 1992 Constitution, the EC is seeking to lay a CI before Parliament to regulate the continuous voter registration exercise.
Per the Article 11(7), the CI, which seeks, among other things, to make the Ghana Card the sole identification document for the exercise and the only means for registration, when laid in Parliament, will come into force after 21 sitting days, except the house annuls it by a vote of not less than two-thirds of all Members of Parliament (MPs).
Mr Baah, said in the case of Nii Tetteh Opremreh v EC and A-G, the Supreme Court in interpreting and enforcing Article 11(7) of the Constitution, held that apart from annulment, other act by Parliament such as amendment, variation or change in a subsidiary legislation was unconstitutional.
According to him, the insistence by Parliament for the EC to include the guarantor system before the C.I would be considered, was not an annulment and therefore technically the House had no power to force it down the throat of the EC as that would sin against Article 11(7) of the 1992 Constitution, as enforced by the Supreme Court in the case of Nii Tetteh Opremreh v EC and A-G.
“The Supreme Court has ruled that if Parliament does not take advantage of the annulment power under Article 11(7) of the 1992 Constitution, it cannot do any other thing that is binding on the body that presented the subsidiary legislation.
The Supreme Court was emphatic that when it comes to subsidiary legislation, Parliament is only a conduit through which constitutional bodies vested with power can bring a subsidiary legislation into force,” he said.
Pre-laying
As part of the pre-laying process of the CI- the Public Elections (Registration of Voters) Regulation, 2023, Parliament rejected the EC’s decision to make the Ghana Card the sole means for the registration.
The House unanimously recommended to the EC to include the guarantor system in the CI before it could present it for consideration.
Legislators were of the view that unless and until the challenges confronting the issuance of the Ghana Card were dealt with, using the card as the only medium of voter registration would negatively impact the electoral roll and thereby deny some otherwise qualified persons from registering to vote.
The House took the decision after legislators adopted the report of the Committee of the Whole on the draft CI.
The report was signed by the Chairman of the Committee of the Whole, Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, who is also the Speaker of Parliament,
Soon after the House had adopted the Committee of the Whole’s report, the Speaker said the House would now not depend on the assurances from the EC or the NIA but “we are now making inputs into the preparation of the CI”.
No legal effect
However, Mr Baah, who is also a former Chairman of the Judicial Committee and former Vice Chairman of the Subsidiary Legislation Committee of Parliament, was of the view that although Parliament had a right to go through a pre-laying process for the CI, the decision made during the pre-laying process had no legal effect.
In view of that, he said the report of the Committee of the Whole of the House and its subsequent acceptance by the House for the EC to include the guarantor system was not binding.
“Article 11(7) as interpreted and enforced by the Supreme Court in Nii Tetteh Opremreh v EC and A-G is the current case law governing subsidiary legislations. Therefore, whatever exercise undertaken by Parliament in respect of unanimously agreeing for the EC to include the guarantor system was not necessary because it would not have any legal impact.
He also wondered why Parliament unanimously voted to recommend to the EC to include the guarantor system when the CI had not been properly laid before the house.
Mr Baah said if Parliament was not happy about the exclusion of the guarantor system from the CI, the lawful procedure was for the House to allow the EC to lay the CI and then annul it by two-thirds majority as stipulated by Article 11(7) of the Constitution and interpreted in Nii Tetteh Opremreh v EC and A-G.
“If Parliament insists that its decision for the EC to include the guarantor system is binding, then the exercise it undertook on March 31by voting to recommend to the EC to include the guarantor system is unconstitutional.”
Source: Graphic
The government is set to lay before Parliament today, November 21, a Constitutional Instrument (C.I) seeking to restrict the importation of selected strategic products into the country.
The items, numbering over 20, will include rice, tripe (popularly called “yemuadie” in Ghana), and diapers.
The government said the move is part of efforts to enhance local production.
Speaking during a press briefing in Parliament, the Minister of Trade and Industry, K.T Hammond said, “Stomach of animals, bladder and the chunk of intestines (yemuadie), the country had had to put in an amount of about $164 million towards the importation of these items. We are taking steps to ensure that in terms of rice, there’s no poverty of rice in the country.”
He emphasized, “By these restrictions, we are not going to ensure that there’s no food in the country at all; that is not the point at all. There have to be some efforts by the government to ensure that we go back to Acheampong’s operation feed yourself. There are about 22 items on the list, one of them, I think, is diapers.”
He announced the introduction of the Ghana Standards Authority Regulations 2023, which also seeks to streamline the manufacturing of cement to ensure competitive pricing.
Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia says former President John Dramani Mahama does not understand the 24-hour economy policy he is proposing.
According to the Vice President, that policy is already being implemented in the country, as hospitals, fuel companies, among others, operate a 24-hour system.
Dr. Bawumia, therefore, urged Ghanaians to ignore Mahama during the 2024 polls since he has nothing new to offer and vote for the New Patriotic Party.
“John Mahama says he has a new idea. What is the idea? He says he wants a 24-hour economy. He doesn’t even understand that policy. Today in Ghana, our hospitals work 24 hours, our electricity company works 24 hours, our water company works 24 hours, our fuel stations work 24 hours, and many chop bars work 24 hours. Today because of digitalisation, you can transfer money 24 hours, you can receive money 24 hours… So he doesn’t understand his own policy. It doesn’t make sense.”
“So I want you to vote for me in 2024 because I will bring a new vision, I will bring a new policy. Mahama is the past, Dr Bawumia is the future. If John Mahama was there, we would say we have a dumsor economy, you can’t have a 24-hour economy in dumsor. So, you want to vote for Dr Bawumia in 2024, we will take the country to new heights,” Dr Bawumia stated.
The Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, has accused the International Monetary Fund (IMF) of pressuring the House to pass a number of bills under a certificate of urgency.
Mr. Bagbin cited bills such as the Affirmative Action Bill, which is allegedly being pushed by the IMF as part of the conditionality for the balance of the $3 billion credit facility for Ghana.
Speaking at the Speaker’s Breakfast Meeting on Monday, Alban Bagbin insisted that the House will not be coerced by the IMF to pass the bill.
“Even in this budget, you can see the arm of the IMF in a lot of provisions in the budget. A critical bill like the Affirmative Action Gender Equality Bill has come to Parliament under a certificate of urgency. Please, it won’t happen; we won’t pass it under a certificate of urgency.”
“There are critical stakeholders we must consult and make sure we go together. We will not be dictated by the IMF; that one, you can be assured. This is a very critical bill that the IMF should know that we need the buy-in of the stakeholders to be able to implement it,” Alban Bagbin said.
The Affirmative Action Bill, when passed into law, would seek to expunge the historically low representation of women in decision-making spaces and promote democracy and development through all-inclusive participation.
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