Ghanaian officials erupt into violence on suspicion of malice

Reports indicated that the parliamentary members of the West African country began destroying furniture and getting physical with each other, following a dispute during their meeting.

Following the violent altercation, the police were called upon to quell the hysteria.

The meeting was intended to vet Ghana’s new ministerial appointments.

As reported by BBC, the vetting committee had disagreed on some issues, leading to the subsequent frenzy.

The dispute primarily erupted from accusations that opposition MPs were dragging out the process to settle political scores.

The cross-party committee was tasked with vetting three MPs from the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC).

The three people in question had been nominated for cabinet positions following the NDC’s victory over the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in the December elections.

However, NDC MPs accused Alexander Afenyo-Markin, the NPP’s parliamentary leader, of evaluating the cabinet nominees for an unreasonably lengthy period.

The evaluation of a single nominee (communications minister designate Samuel Nartey George) was said to have dragged on for over five hours.

Several MPs of the NDC party, felt like the delay was a form of retaliation from opposition MPs on the committee, who wanted George to withdraw his criticism of former president and NPP leader Nana Akufo-Addo and Vice-President Mahamadu Bawumia.

Some members of the vetting commitee stood up yelling, shoving each other, and overturning tables.

On Friday, the NPP’s Afenyo-Markin stated that parliamentary norms gave committee members “the opportunity to enquire deeply into every nominee of the president, without limit to questions.”

He accused the NDC of trying to “frustrate” the entire process.

Consequently the vetting meeting has been pushed back to Friday.

The head of the vetting committee issued an apology to the Ghanaian public the following morning, describing the incident as “totally unacceptable”.