By Godfred Zina
On Thursday, December 2, 2022, the Member of Parliament for Bawku Central, Mahama Ayariga, stated on the GTV Breakfast Show that democracy is not a machine for approving everything.
According to him, if democracy is only a function, people will lose faith in the democratic system.
” The most important thing you must realize is that a democracy is not necessarily a machine for approving everything. You can’t use democracy to legitimize everything, if democratic function is simply to legitimize everything then people will begin to say that democracy is not worth it”.
The Law Maker explained to critics of the Minority actions in Parliament that democracy is about recognizing and eliminating excesses in order to maintain people’s trust and faith in democracy.
” The activity of democratic System is to …….eliminate excesses, that will make people continue to have faith in democracy so those who are saying oh what you’re doing is distracting the System really? It is what we are doing that is rather fortifying and legitimizing the System so that the ordinary citizens will have confidence that, oh don’t worry, don’t resort to violence, don’t take up fight, don’t support any soldier because as for Parliament if the thing is bad, they will fight unless the thing is removed”, he said.
Mr. Ayariga went on to say that Parliament has the power to correct the Executive, and judges have the power to check both the Executive and the Legislature in order to restore trust.
“So Parliament has that capacity to correct the Executive, the judges have the capacity to check the Executive and the Parliament.
If people lose confidence in the Court as a place where justice will prevail and they lose confidence in Parliament as a place that can check the Executive.
Democracy is not waiting for some arbitrary thing to come and kick it upside down and there would be popular support,” he posited.
In reference to the Sub Region, the Bawku Central MP stated that he had served in the Ecowas Parliament and witnessed the coup in Mali.
“I have been in the Ecowas Parliament, I go around the Sub Region, I saw what happened in Mali, the day when the shooting started I was there, I was there when the coup occurred, I was there actually to mediate and prevent the Coup because we anticipated it. So those making the noise that oh what you’re doing is distracting, is because they don’t know,” Mr. Ayariga stated.
