The Director of Legal Affairs of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Abraham Amaliba, has assured the party’s caucus in Parliament of protection during their campaign this month.
The assurance came in wake of the declaration made by the opposition party’s Functional Executive Committee on March 8, 2023, temporarily putting the campaign toward their upcoming parliamentary primaries on hold for the “Operation Save Our Democracy” campaign.
Some MPs, in effect, raised concerns about the directive especially when it came with threats of sanctions should any MP disregard the order.
One of the concerns pertained to enforcement in ensuring that the situation does not favour aspirants who are not lawmakers over those in office because the beginners are in the constituencies and would privately campaign against the sitting MPs.
But to assuage the fears of the MPs, Mr Amaliba who also serves on the FEC stated the enforcement is in the hands of the constituency executives and regional executives who will be able to uncover the secret campaigns of aspirants should there be any such attempts.
“Those who are supposed to guide the process, which is the constituency executives, are the ones who are supposed to do the leg work and focus on the parliamentary candidates who want to contest and find out whether they are campaigning or not.
“So if a constituency executive comes up with a report that a certain parliamentary candidate is found campaigning either meeting people one-on-one, that parliamentary candidate will be subjected to disciplinary actions.
“So we are told that the enforcement will be done to the latter,” the executive said in an interview with 3 FM monitored by Angelonline.com.gh
Meanwhile, he has advised that MPs do accordingly as directed by the party since what is required of them is nothing compared to what they would lose.
“The CI in parliament if passed in the form in which it is would even affect the MPs the more. That is one.
“Two, the sacrifice we are calling on them to do is not too much when you compare to the fact that when the CI passes it may even bring their MP-ship to an end”
