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Re-assigned ministers must be vetted – Dafeamekpor
President Akufo-Addo’s decision to reassign five Ministers of State to various ministries has drawn harsh criticism from Rockson Nelson Dafeamekpor, the Member of Parliament for South Dayi, who described the move as “untenable.”
He contends that they must appear before the appointments committee with the new ministers for vetting because their appointments were revoked before they were reassigned.
Dafeamekpor has gone further, threatening to take legal action by requesting a Supreme Court ruling on the reassignment of the five ministers and pursuing an injunction against the screening of other nominees.
The ministers Mohammed Amin Adam, Henry Quartey, Francis Asenso-Boakye, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, Ambrose Dery, and Abdulai Abanga were reassigned to different positions by President Akufo-Addo in a ministerial reshuffle that was announced on Wednesday, February 14.
“Once you have revoked an appointment of a minister of state, the person is no longer in the position of a minister, for which he can be reassigned to another portfolio. If the President is minded to re-engage those persons he has disappointed some moments ago, he’s permitted under the constitution to do so. But they have to be subjected to the constitutional procedure of appointments.”
“If that is not done, I’m serving notice, I will proceed to the Supreme Court to seek interpretation in the matter. And I’m serving notice that I will seek an injunction on the vetting process that those 5 persons cannot proceed to be reassigned and act in their portfolio until the final determination of the matter,” he said in an interview on Citi FM’s Eyewitness News.
He emphasized that the five ministers’ appointments were revoked, which means they are no longer in their ministerial roles and cannot be transferred.
Dafeamekpor chastised the President for trying to avoid parliamentary scrutiny of the reassigned ministers, emphasizing that since their original portfolios have changed, parliamentary vetting is necessary.
