Tema West MP Suspended

Assembly members of the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA) have suspended the Member of Parliament for Tema West constituency, Mr. Carlos Kingsley Ahenkorah, who also doubles as the Deputy Minister for Trade and Industry.

The suspension of the MP will last for a period six-month which bars him from taking part in all activities of the assembly.

To this end, the Hon. Ahenkorah cannot transact any business with the assembly.  Similarly the MCE has also been advised against transacting business with the suspended MP.

The decision was arrived at an emergency meeting held by the members of the assembly in Tema yesterday after the MP publicly prevented members of the assembly’s task force from demolishing illegal structures on the COCOBOD village at Community Two.

Presiding Member of the TMA, Mr. Richard Fiadomor, said the assembly members themselves had passed a law that the assembly was going to get rid of all illegal structures in the metropolis without any interference, especially from any MP.

He said since the MP was a member of the assembly and knew all the rules and decided to attack the engineer, task force and MCE, it showed his deliberate attempt to thwart the assembly’s effort at beautifying Tema.

“This is a test case for the assembly, which goes to point out that MPs do not have the power to obstruct the work of the assembly,” he posited.

Mr. Fiadomor also revealed that the MP was served with a letter to appear before the assembly yesterday, but failed to honour that invitation.

According to him, the decision by the Assembly to suspend the MP was in accordance with Local Government Act 963 (102 C).

It would be recalled that on 31st of August, 2017 the TMA task force and engineer were chased out of the COCOBOD village after they had gone there to demolish illegal structures.

The assembly members voted for the suspension or otherwise of the MP, and out of 34 members, 25 voted for his suspension whilst 9 were against it.

Earlier, two Assembly members—Mr. Christian Yaw Amoah and Dennis Amarnor Tetteh—who also attacked the MCE for decongesting the frontage of the Tema Metropolitan Assembly, were however pardoned but their September allowance would be withheld.

This is because they rendered an unqualified apology to the MCE and the assembly members.

Source: Todaygh.com