Interpret Articles 97 (g,h) to resolve parliamentary crisis – Dr Osae-Kwapong

 The Supreme Court must expe­dite action on the interpretation of Article 97(G) and (H) of the Con­stitution to resolve the current parliamentary crisis, the Director of the Democracy Project, Dr John Osae-Kwapong, has said.

With less than 50 days to the general election, he said a swift interpretation of the constitutional provision was crucial to settle the ongoing dispute between Parlia­ment and the Judiciary to deepen the country’s democracy.

“The Supreme Court has to help us interpret 97 G and H. Once this is done, the matter will be settled,” he said in an interview with The Ghanaian Times in Accra on Tues­day on the current parliamentary crisis.

The interview was on the side-lines of a capacity building work­shop for media on governance and anti-corruption reforms organised by the Ghana Anti-Corruption Coalition (GACC), Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) and the Africa Cen­tre for Energy Policy (ACEP).

It is as part of their Anti-Cor­ruption Initiative for Enhancing Governance Reforms project being sponsored by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development office.

Article 97(1) of the 1992 Con­stitution states that “A member of Parliament shall vacate his seat in Parliament— (g) if he leaves the party of which he was a member at the time of his election to Parlia­ment to join another party or seeks to remain in Parliament as an inde­pendent member; or (h) if he was elected a member of Parliament as an independent candidate and joins a political party.”

The Speaker of Parliament, Al­ban Bagbin, on Tuesday adjourned parliament indefinitely following tensions between the legislative and judicial arms of government over interpretation of the article.

This came days after the Supreme Court temporarily stayed the Speak­er’s ruling to declare four parliamen­tary seats vacant in line with Article 97 due to the decisions of the affected MPs to change the ticket on which they entered parliament.

According to Dr Osae-Kwapong, while the Speaker had provided his interpretation of Article 97(G) and (H), the constitution designates the Supreme Court as the final arbiter in such constitutional matters.

He suggested that leaders of the three arms of government needed to meet and resolve their differenc­es.

“Sometimes it takes leaders in such a moment to say, look, instead of escalating things, let’s all sit down, let cool heads prevail. You don’t lose your independence. It just simply says, for the sake of the country’s democracy and gover­nance architecture, these differences that are emerging, how do we resolve them?”

While acknowledging the current situation as a test for Ghana’s democracy, Dr Osae-Kwapong maintained that constitutional crises were not necessarily negative.

“Constitutional tests and crises are not bad things. You expect them to happen in democracies. What matters is whether the system holds together and whether we learn the right lessons from it,” he explained.

The democracy expert highlight­ed that Ghana had made significant strides in developing democratic attitudes, citing Afrobarometer surveys showing strong public support for democracy, term limits, and parliamentary oversight of the executive.

However, he expressed concern about the deepening partisan polar­isation in the country. “Think about any issue and five minutes into the conversation, it becomes an NPP and NDC matter,” he observed, calling for consensus-building around national priorities.

Dr Osae-Kwapong pointed to implementation challenges as a major hurdle in Ghana’s governance architecture.

Despite having well-designed in­stitutions and regulations, he noted that regulatory oversight remains weak across critical sectors, compli­cated by both human and financial resource constraints.

The Executive Director of the Gll, Mrs Mary Addah, in her open­ing address at the workshop urged the media to use the tools they were being equipped with at the event to help fight corruption and demand accountable governance.

 BY JONATHAN DONKOR

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