By Landing Colley
The Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly has overturned a motion over the draft constitution tabled by a member of parliament for Serrekunda, Honorable Halifa Sallah.
The Deputy Speaker overturned this motion which sought for making a statement on the current state of the fumbled new constitution building process and parliament role in facilitating a speedy and favorable outcome on Tuesday, 15th December 2020.
“I write to convey to the Honorable Speaker my request to make a statement on the current state of the new constitution building process and the role of the national assembly in facilitating a speedy and favorable outcome.
“The statement is with your office and what is receive was a scrap of paper that appear to emanated from your office and I don’t think that is respectable in any way that is why I am requesting hear the ruling from you. This is a scrap of paper,” member for Serrekunda, Honorable Halifa said verbally to members of the assembly.
But the Deputy Speaker, Momodou LK Sanneh quickly interjected that the standing order 515 states “as soon as possible after receiving a formal request, the speaker shall decide whether to give the member who had made a formal request under this standing order live to make a statement and shall immediately notify the member of the decision and I have made a decision in the morning and the copy of the decision has been forwarded to you.”
At this juncture, honourable Sallah replied that: Honrable “Speaker, your office is immensely respected but I have emphasized to you again and I don’t want to continue to use the term, I have received a scrap of paper, but I have not received anything from the speaker of the National Assembly.”
“What is an official communication from the speaker of the National Assembly?” he asked and added that it must be on record as the National Assembly is public gathering.
However, honurable deputy speaker Sanneh finally ruled against Sallah’s motion saying: “Honorable member for Serrekunda filed an application motion under clause 514 of the standing order seeking a permission from the speaker to make a statement on the current state of the new constitution building and role of the national assembly to facilitate speedy and favourable outcome.”
“Having gone through the provision and determine whether lives should be given or not I now arrive to the conclusion. The criterion under clause 513 (d) is of relevant with admissible to the application. The said paragraph clearly stated that lives should not be granted as the propose statement of the applicant was subjected to previous application by the Honorable member for Surrekunda which was 14th December, 2020 based on the reason 513 (d) the application for the live is here not granted,” he added.
