Ministers who were not appointed from Parliament, and several other appointees, have one overriding fear: That they may wake up one day to find themselves de-appointed out of office.
In search of a way out, many have seen the 2004 parliamentary election as a God-sent opportunity to end their insecurity. Thus they have been jostling for space as parliamentary candidates, on occasion with their relatives.
The fond dream of one such Minister from the Shai-Osudoku constituency has, however, been aborted by the conditionality for Parliament imposed by the 1992 Constitution and reflected in the Constitutions of the various parties.
She is Deputy Attorney-General and Minister of Justice Gloria Akuffo, whose application to contest the Shai-Osudoku NPP primary election suffered a fatal setback at the vetting stage recently.
The Heritage can confirm after weeks of investigations in the constituency and the NPP Headoffice that the deputy Attorney-General does not qualify to contest the NPP primaries, let alone stand on the party’s ticket for 2004.
The NPP Constitution only permits candidates who have registered or have their names in the Voters Register of particular constituencies to stand for election in those constituencies. In other words, only eligible voters in any particular constituency are allowed by the NPP Constitution to contest elections there.
The NPP Constitution also requires candidates seeking to contest in a particular constituency to be resident there for at least two years before seeking election. In the case of Miss Akuffo, though a lawyer by profession, she has been caught by the NPP Constitution as having no legal basis to contest the party’s parliamentary slot. First of all, The Heritage learnt, the learned lawyer is not a registered voter of the Shai-Osudoku constituency and has never voted in the area.
Secondly, Miss Akuffo, though a native of Osudoku, has not resided in the constituency for over a decade, thus disqualified to contest the NPP primaries.
Heritage sources hinted that these constitutional requirements were raised when Miss Akuffo was vetted about a month ago, and indeed she was left with no room to manoeuvre.
Being the only strong force that could derail the dream of the Dangbe West DCE to contest the Shai-Osudoku seat on the NPP’s ticket, her obvious disqualification means DCE Agban, her uncle, stands tall to win the slot possibly unopposed.
Source: GhanaWeb
