NPP and NDC face off in 2021 SONA

Parliament Speaker Alban Bagbin, at the start of debate on the State of the Nation 2021 message on Wednesday, warned MPs not to turn the House into a children’s playground.

The debate followed the presentation of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo’s State of the Nation address on Tuesday, in which he briefed Ghanaians on the performance of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government during the first term. under his leadership. and makes projections into the future.

However, some fellow lawmakers were incessantly heckled when those who caught the Speaker’s attention made their remarks, forcing the Speaker to warn that he would not tolerate any act to turn the House into a playground.

The angry president noted the loud interruptions and heckling from some lawmakers during the president’s presentation of SONA.

When they started singing loudly at the start of the debate, Speaker Bagbin warned that the chamber was not a musical theater and that he would not allow MPs to turn the chamber into a playground.

President Bagbin said, “Honorable Members, this is not a musical theater. What happened in Parliament yesterday I do not want to talk about. Do not turn parliament into a playground, I will not tolerate this at all.

Mr. Eric Opoku, MP for South Asunafo, who was on his feet, continued his presentation after the President’s warning, and said President Akufo-Addo’s speech did not include how the government had handled the ‘economy.

Mr Opoku asked why Ghana’s national debt was increasing, noting that “In December 2020, our nation’s debt increased to GHS 286.9 billion, according to the Bank of Ghana, indicating that over the past four years , the nuclear power plant government has increased our total debt stock by GH ¢ 165 billion ”.

According to the member for Asunafo Sud, “no government in the history of Ghana has ever borrowed this amount of money in the space of four years”.

He noted that Ghana’s debt, as he told the Bank of Ghana, accounts for 74.4% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).

“Even though we have to add all the borrowing from all the governments that we have had in this country, they never borrowed more than 165 billion GHS. We expect to whom we give a lot. Our nation’s debt, as expressed by the Bank of Ghana, represents 74.4% of our GDP. This is well above the IMF’s 70% debt sustainability threshold, ”he said.

The legislator wondered why the government had securitized a number of the country’s resources.

He suggested that the President’s announcement that three helicopters had been purchased for the Ghana Police Service was false.

Mr Opoku also took issue with the part of the presentation that the country was food secure if it imported tomatoes from other parts of the world, thus ending the fact that the government had caused hardship to the people.

— RNG