The Minority in Parliament is requesting that the Minister for Health, Kwaku Agyeman Manu, the Minister for Information, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, and the Frontier Healthcare Service who were honoured with national awards at the equitable ended 2023 National Awards ceremony ought to be peeled off their honours.
As per the NDC MPs, not exclusively are these people undeserving of the awards, however they are likewise the subject of a parliamentary test into the management of Coronavirus consumption - whereupon they were awarded.
Tending to a question and answer session in Parliament, Ranking Member on the Parliamentary Select Committee on Health, Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, said that "the Minister for Health, the Minister for Information and others referred to in the Auditor General's audit of Coronavirus reserves and other undeserving awardees ought to be deprived of their national honour to keep up with the holiness of the awards in any case we risk what is going on in which meriting Ghanaians will evade the awards by and large."
He explained that this is the initial time in Ghana's set of experiences that people whose lead are as of now being investigated by a Parliamentary Committee of Enquiry are publicly decorated with genuinely incredible recognitions.
The MP for Juaboso accepts that this is "a frantic endeavor by the President to settle the defilement clearing process that he started during the message of the State of the Nation Address in Parliament."
"It beats the creative mind of sensible Ghanaians how a Health Minister who in the relatively recent past was investigated for how he mocked our obtainment laws to award an overrated contract for the acquirement of Sputnik V in what resembled an underhand managing to dupe the state was offered the truly incredible recognition of the Request for the Volta," he added.
Referencing the Information Minister, Mr Akandoh said that Mr Nkrumah was referred to in the Auditor General's report for having offered unapproved leniency payments to the staff of his office during the pandemic.
The Ranking Member said that it is upsetting to see the pastor offered the incredible recognitions of the Request for the Volta before his direct or wrongdoing is completely investigated and gotten by the Parliamentary Committee of Enquiry.
"Of more prominent concern is the presenting of national honours on Frontiers Healthcare Service Limited, a company whose proprietorship is hazy and whose development and tasks were created by an contract that Parliament is yet to be informed about for supposed national safety reasons of which most Ghanaians are of the assessment that Ghanaians were fleeced of their super assets during the pandemic," Mr Akandoh said.
He expressed that the awards, given to perceive difficult work, devotion and responsibility towards the upkeep and progression of the state regarding Coronavirus, ought to be proffered on the forefront workers.
He explained that a considerable lot of them worked broadened hours, and forfeited their health and lives to ensure that few others didn't die.
"Around 6,543 of them who really contracted Coronavirus with some perishing in their line of service are as yet ready to be paid those small protection bundles guaranteed them since the year 2020. Their awards stand by in unendingness even as we quickly give national awards on those whose activities are yet to be legitimate before a parliamentary board of trustees of enquiry."
Mr Akandoh trusts that these honours test the sensibilities of Ghanaians as well as settle for the status quo recently set and kept up with by past awardees by coexisting meriting and undeserving awardees at the occasion.
