Why Haruna Iddrisu rejected Speaker for 8th Parliament position

It has emerged that some Minority (NDC) MPs led by Mohammed-Mubarak Muntaka and Mahama Ayariga lured and encouraged Minority Leader Haruna Iddrisu to contest for the position of Speaker of Parliament.

“A group of NDC MPs led by the honourable Mahama Ayariga, some of our colleagues, and my able Whip, the honourable Muntaka Mubarak had come to my office to lure me and to encourage me to run for the position of speaker,” Haruna Iddrisu disclosed at the thanksgiving service held in honour of Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin in the Waala Traditional Area of the Upper West Region.

Iddrisu added, “I knew in my heart God will have favour on someone amongst us therefore in a subsequent meeting of the Minority caucus, I had questioned the honourable Ayariga and my colleagues that I was not too sure whether they had the mandate or my authority to proceed further with their good intentions. Then in a meeting with the NDC’s highest leadership somewhere in the offices of former President Mahama, I said to the group that my candidate for speaker was amongst us and pointed to honourable Alban Bagbin and the honourable Aseidu Nketia; before [I] could land the honourable Aseidu Nketia held the hand of honourable Bagbin strongly and said it should be the honourable Bagbin.

“Little did I know that good fate and God’s glory was vested in him [Alban Bagbin]. We then conspired, led then by the Whip to come and work and see what God’s grace will be and to his glory and grace we have the [….] Speaker of the 8th Parliament; not just the ordinary, but the most experienced among our group, the most qualified among our group in whom we trust that he will be fair and firm as Speaker of Ghana and not just [with] any political group in Ghana.”

Alban Bagbin, on the eve of January 7, this year, was elected Speaker of the 8th Parliament.

He polled 138 votes during a secret ballot while his predecessor Prof Aaron Mike Oquaye of the NPP polled 136 votes.

He is the first elected Speaker of Parliament from an opposition party in Ghanaian politics.