Bernard Ahiafor, Alexander Afenyo-Markin
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The Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Bernard Ahiafor, has expressed frustration with Minority Leader Alexander Afenyo-Markin’s behavior, despite their good working relationship.
The Akatsi South MP and First Deputy Speaker of Parliament spoke candidly while describing the relationship.
“I have a very good relationship with him, but sometimes I find it very difficult to take the excess,” Ahiafor admitted.
He specifically cited Mr. Afenyo-Markin’s tendency to backtrack on agreed decisions, saying, “I am one particular person who will not agree on one thing with you, and after a few minutes or a few hours, you behave as if that was not what we agreed upon. It pisses me off.”
Ahiafor also dismissed Afenyo-Markin’s claims that the Clerk of the Appointments Committee had been partisan or withheld reports from him.
“There is nothing that the clerk of the committee has put out there that we have not agreed upon,” Ahiafor emphasized. “There is no occasion that the clerk will not give me and give the Minority Leader a draft report… Even if you go back to recap, there are instances where the two of us will be sitting down, and the clerk will hold two reports, give me one, and give him one—in the full glare of the camera.”
Ahiafor suggested that Afenyo-Markin’s background as a former Majority Leader may influence his expectations and leadership approach in his current role. “It’s about time for him to realise that he is no longer the Majority Leader, but he’s a Minority Leader,” Ahiafor stated. “He can use any adjectives to describe himself—mighty, happy, whatever—but for me, he is in the minority… It doesn’t look like he understands that, and sometimes I believe he forgets himself.”
Additionally, Ahiafor clarified that committee clerks do not take directives from the Ranking Member but from the Chairman of the Committee.
“By our practice, clerks of the committee don’t take decisions from the Ranking Member. They take decisions from the Chairman of the Committee,” he explained. “But because he is coming from the Majority point of view, I think he sometimes forgets himself and fails to realise that he is now in the Minority.”
By Vera Owusu Sarpong