Ofori-Atta safe as vote of censure fails after Majority walkout

The Minority in Parliament’s Censure motion seeking to remove the embattled Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, has failed as less than 183 MPs voted to remove the Minister.

A total of 136 National Democratic Congress MPs voted on Thursday calling for the removal of Mr Ofori-Atta but the number did not meet the two-thirds constitutional requirement for the motion to succeed.

New Patriotic Party Members of Parliament who were not in support of the motion from the Minority earlier walked out of the Chamber.

The Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Mensah, who led the walkout stated that the Majority caucus will not support the censure motion describing it as baseless and politically motivated.

Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu speaking on the floor noted that the censure motion by the NDC side was intended to embarrass the Finance Minister.

“You (the Minority) want us to follow you on this misadventure. Mr. Speaker, like Pontius Pilate did, we will wash our hands of this”, he stated.

There have been many calls for the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta to resign or be sacked due to his abysmal management of the economy.

About 80 MPs from the governing New Patriotic Party held a press conference asking the President to sack his cousin, failure of which they will not support government business going forward.

The NDC MPs also filed a censure motion demanding the removal of the Finance Minister following which the Speaker referred it to an 8-member ad-hoc committee for a hearing.

The Committee subsequently presented its report to Parliament on November 25, 2022.

It was then tabled in the order paper for debate and subsequent vote today.