Kennedy Agyapong, Sam George bury hatchet; recalled GIBA meeting fruitful

General News of Thursday, 27 September 2018

Source: Myjoyonline.com

2018-09-27

Sam George  Kennedy Agyapong  Kennedy Agyapong and Sam George

A disagreement between Parliament’s Communications Committee Chairman and a member of the committee has been resolved and the outcome of the meeting has been fruitful.

Kennedy Agyapong and his colleague from the opposition were reported to have engaged in an altercation during a meeting with Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA); forcing the meeting to be suspended.

A member of the committee Ras Mubarak described the exchanges as “embarrassing.”

“It was a dent on the credibility of Parliament,” he said, adding Parliament that must move quickly to reconstitute the committee.

The meeting was recalled some 30 minutes later and the two legislators have since apologised to each other for the gaffe.

Speaking to the media after the meeting, Mr Agyapong explained that he was furious with the Ningo Prampram MP because he had made comments at an IMANI forum Wednesday . They were comments he was not happy about.

Mr Agyapong said the committee had decided to meet with GIBA on Thursday so he was surprised to hear Sam George speaking prior to that event.

“But he has explained to me that somebody made derogatory comments about our committee and that made him respond to those comments. I didn’t hear the comments until today,” the Assin Central MP said.

He added that they have since buried the hatchet and the deliberations with GIBA have been fruitful.

“You can ask GIBA whatever decisions we took and how the deliberations went,” Mr Agyapong said.

Telling his side of the story, Sam George confirmed what Agyapong said; adding that tensions rose to that extent just because they are both passionate about the topic and want the best for Ghana.

“Don’t forget he is a member of GIBA and I also have constituents who are employees of members of GIBA so we all passionate about what is right for Ghana and that’s what we are going to do,” Sam George said.

Both have dismissed comments that their exchanges were physical.

The MPs, however, are tight-lipped on the identity of the person who made the comments, prompting Sam George to speak and what the person said.

Background

GIBA members are mourning what they describe as an unfair invasion of the Ghanaian market by a Chinese competitor Startimes and are seeking help from Parliament.

For weeks they have engaged in a media war with the Communications Ministry in a desperate attempt to have government rescind its decision to award the contract expansion of the Digital Terrestrial Television platform to Startimes, a Chinese company.

On Thursday, the GIBA members went to Parliament, hoping to rally the support of the lawmaking body to intervene on their behalf.

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