Government does not intend to regulate churches – MPP MP

General News of Sunday, June 2, 2019

Source: citinewsroom.com

2019-06-02

Assin South MP John Ntim Fordjour has eased fears among Ghanaians over the possible regulation of churches in the country.

He added that the government had no intention of adopting such a law, citing other priority and targeted areas of the nuclear power plant.

Some MPs demand that a law be promulgated to regulate the activities of churches solely owned and run by individuals and self-proclaimed pastors called "one-man churches" who engage in all kinds of illegalities.

Speaking Saturday on the theme "The Big Issue", the MP of Assin South vowed to personally oppose any attempt to pbad such a law, insisting on the that the Nana Akufo-Addo government will not monitor this initiative in any way.

"I do not think the state at this stage – the priority should be to regulate or legislate churches – I think we have much greater priorities to deal with in terms of legislation. If we fail to ask stakeholders to enforce these laws and we now want to legislate, we will not go anywhere with that. As far as I am concerned, the NPP government does not have the power to legislate on churches. This is not a government position. The party has no intention of ever planning to regulate religion. "

"I will be, if not the strongest, one of the strongest advocates, who will resist any attempt to intervene in matters of religion. If we try tomorrow to settle how many times my good friends – the Muslims must pray or the number of times they go to the mosque – the same principles of defense of the rights and principles with which I postulate now will be the same as those that I will use defend them, "he added.

Legislators have argued that it was necessary for Parliament to critically investigate the activities of these churches and pastoralists to protect Ghanaians from exploitation.

MEPs said churches and pastors had adopted all sorts of unacceptable practices in the country.

They added that a certain level of regulation is necessary to prevent these churches and pastors from engaging in abuse, indoctrination and other activities that do not correspond to a valid Christian teaching.

The president gives a joint committee a month to badess the feasibility of a regulation of churches

Meanwhile, Professor Mike Oquaye, Speaker of Parliament, gave a joint committee of Parliament a month to develop recommendations on the eventual regulation of the country 's churches.

The committees responsible for this responsibility are the Committee on Youth, Sports and Culture and the Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs.

The referral follows Wednesday's debate on the ground, during which deputies called on the state to regulate the activities of churches to a man because of the many excesses badociated with their activities.