Minority storm out of Parliament over AMERI deal

• Posted on August 1, 2017
• by Nana Kwesi Coomson
• Comment

The Minority in Parliament stormed out of Parliament on Tuesday over the Speaker’s decision to forward the motion to withdraw the 2015 AMERI deal to the House’s Energy Committee.

Indicating his displeasure to Citi News, the Minority Chief Whip, Alhaji Mohammed Mubarak Muntaka said, “this is the first time in my whole life in Parliament that I am seeing that a motion, when it is just moved and seconded, is referred to a committee.”

“You see, we keep talking about the gagging but people don’t understand because it is not for nothing that the Minority Leader stands. It is because the Minority have reasons to speak and if you do everything to prevent them from speaking, you make the House very difficult to govern.”

“This is the first time in my whole life in Parliament that I am seeing that a motion, when it just moved and seconded, is referred to a committee.”

The motion which was filed by K.T Hammond, who was the ranking member of the Energy Committee of Parliament in 2015 when the deal was approved, seeks to reverse the decision.

The John Mahama administration in 2015 signed a contract with Africa and Middle East Resources Investment Group’s (AMERI Energy) to rent the 300MW of emergency power from AMERI at the peak of the country’s power crisis.

The power agreement with UAE-based AMERI Energy deal cost 510m.

It later emerged that the government had been shortchanged by AMERI as they presented an overpriced budget and government overpaid by $150 million.

-Citifmonline