Michael Donyinah Mensah, Executive Director of the Centre for Public Opinion and Awareness (CenPOA), has branded the New Patriotic Party (NPP) as "bitter losers."
He stated that this dates back to the postcolonial era when Dr. Kwame Nkrumah was in power.
According to him, the late Nkrumah was vilified by the "elephant family" and heavily criticised even when it was needless.
”This degree of hostility persisted during the formulation of the 1992 constitution. One party chose not to participate in the process. They also didn’t participate in the 1992 general election. For the first time in our history, the same party went to court to contest the presidential election. As a result, it looks like one party is notorious for doing things their way. They will always oppose things and criticise them when they do not go their way.
"Our politics in Ghana is terrible because it would have been prudent for our political parties to unite for the common good of the country and work together for the common development of Ghana, but they both have their different agendas," he said.
He advised political parties to appreciate the need for the national interest instead of personal and parochial interests.
"When we are confronted with challenges, our politicians must put their political differences aside and think about the national interest and what they can do to make the country progress," he explained.
Reacting to the ongoing controversies in parliament and the clamour for who is the majority in Parliament, he said there are several important bills that the House should consider, but the ongoing impasse has brought everything to a halt.
“We are hopeful that the House will reconsider the need to recall the MPs so that they can attend to urgent matters. This is a defining moment for Ghana because we never expected to get to this stage. We shouldn’t have come here. When you look at what led us here today, you’ll notice that one NPP MP opted to run as an independent candidate, and the NPP launched a witch hunt against him.
"They had all of the manpower they needed, but they were locked in this scenario since they were witch-hunting someone who defected to go independent, and it has now come back to harm them.
"At the time, the law that saw the Fomena seat declared vacant was wrong, but because the NPP benefitted from it, they saw nothing wrong with it. Today, the same scenario is playing out, and they have turned into bitter losers. We may not see the effects of these issues today but in the near future, and that may potentially harm us." he added.
Mensah commended the Speaker for suspending the House indefinitely while suggesting that "if this decision would have no serious or negative impact, I think Parliament should suspend sitting indefinitely until the end of the December 7, 2024, presidential and parliamentary elections’’.