Tema, April 14, CDA Consult – The Ghana Federation of Labour (GFL) has expressed concern that sometimes the public blame President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for unjustifiable but “I think those around him are not advising him well. The Council of State must live up to the task of advising him as part of their mandate,” Mr. Abraham Koomson, GFL Secretary General stated.
According to him, even though there have been a number of public issues, including the head cut and its resultant picketing by pension bondholders at the Finance Ministry, as well as the passage of the tax bills against the wishes of the majority of the people, the members of the Council of State have not been heard commenting on them in public.
“Even if they advise the President and he is not taking it, they should let us know; they can also resign if their recommendations are not being taken, instead of just being there and adding to the state’s expenditure,” he stated.
He was speaking on the impact of the three bills—the Excise Duty and Excise Tax Stamp (Amendment) Bill, 2022, the Income Tax (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill, 2022, and the Growth and Sustainability Levy Bill, 2022 which were passed by a 137-to-136 majority in Parliament when he appeared on the Ghana News Agency-Tema Industrial News Hub Dialogue platform.
He, therefore, called on the Council of State members to give sound advice to President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo on current economic hardship and its impact on middle- and lower-income earners.
Mr. Koomson said even though the Council has a task to advise President Akufo-Addo on issues as stated in Article 91 of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, the GFL believed that they were not doing enough as policies and some decisions taken by the government do not reflect their advice.
He urged them to listen to the cry of the public about the economic hardship and accordingly advise the President to lessen the burden through good fiscal, social, and developmental policies.
The GFL’s Secretary General also called on parliamentarians to serve as proper checks on the executive arm of government as required of them by rejecting such bills instead of approving them.
He said there was a need for parliamentarians to truly represent the people who voted for them instead of following their parochial interests to the detriment of the citizenry.
Mr. Koomson also called on political parties to organize orientations for people who want to be MPs using their political parties, explaining that it would help them know their ideologies and fight for them.
He stated, for instance, that even though the New Patriotic Party (NPP) says its ideology is capitalism, and that of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) is social democrats, the actions of their representatives in Parliament do
