Parliamentary Press Corps Demands Apology; Majority Leader says ‘No Way’

“Really, I am flabbergasted by this attitude because I have taken pain to explain to you what really transpired; and for you to tell me to apologize to you for telling you the rules of the game that we all subscribe to, my own thinking is that you are a bit going out of bounds,… then you are saying that with what we have done we owe you an apology, respectfully, I don’t owe you an apology”. 

Majority leader, Osei-Kyei Mensah-Bonsu says he does not owe members of the Parliamentary Press Corps (PPC) an apology over Speaker Mike Oquaye’s threats to strip them off media accreditation should they continue to abandon the coverage of business in the plenary for press conferences by individual members of Parliament or Caucuses.

The threat by the Speaker on Wednesday follows a complaint by the majority leader that members of the Corps abandoned proceedings in the house to accommodate the Member of Parliament for Ellembele Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah who was addressing the media on the energy sector at the expense of the debate on the President’s State of the Nation Address on the floor of the House.

In an attempt to restore some level of calmness in the media landscape and especially among members of the Parliamentary Press Corps, leadership of the house and office of Public Affairs held a meeting earlier today to address the issue at hand.

After almost an hour of deliberations and discussions, Members of the Corps expressed their dissatisfaction at the path the majority leader took to address his concern. The members clearly stated that a dialogue between the two parties would have been much appreciated as they are tagged or usually referred to as an ‘ally’ in the running of business in the house.

At the meeting, a senior Member of the Corps, Jeorge Wilson Kingson, on behalf of the members cleared the air that the incident on Tuesday where media personnel left the Chamber to attend to other matters was not the first of its kind and therefore should not be cause for alarm.

He said the incident was unfortunate, hence demanded an apology from the Majority Leader.

“…We did not see anything wrong with this, and so as always we went out but equally came back to the Chamber. What did we miss that the leader of the House had to bring us onto the Floor for the Speaker to give a directive on us? We felt that it was so unfortunate and honorable leader, I do not know if this will be too much but we would demand some apology from you because we were just doing our job”.

However, the majority leader stated categorically that he owes no apology to the members of the Corps, stating that he was flabbergasted at the demand for apology.

Source: Theresa Adezewa Ayittey || ghananewsonline.com.gh