Former Member of Parliament for Bekwai in the Ashanti Region, Joseph Osei-Owusu, has revealed the struggles Parliamentarians face in carrying out their duties.
He stated that apart from their monthly salaries, all other payments for extra work, such as committee appointments, often faced delays.
Speaking to Saddick Adams on the Angel Morning Show (AMS), Osei-Owusu clarified that allowances for the Appointments Committee, after completing their work, were not paid as the public believed.
“Apart from our (MPs’) monthly salaries, which were paid without delays, every other payment due to us was delayed,” he said.
His comments aligned with his earlier remarks on Angel TV, where he emphasized that funds owed to the Appointments Committee were rarely disbursed.
He added that the highest amount he received from the Chief of Staff for facilitating parliamentary work was GHC2,000.00, due to the executive’s failure to fulfill its financial obligations.
Further elaborating, Joe Wise, as he is popularly known, disclosed that during his first two terms in Parliament, he received allowances for fewer than five committee sittings despite serving on more than twenty committees.
“For my first two terms in Parliament, if I take, for instance, 20 committee sittings, only three or four sitting allowances were paid to us. The allowances were not forthcoming,” the former First Deputy Speaker of Parliament stated.
