Northern Bahr el Ghazal dissolves assembly leadership
July 17, 2012 (WAU) – Northern Bahr el Ghazal State Legislative Assembly dissolved its leadership on Tuesday, following unanimous approval of the new cabinet appointed by the state governor Paul Malong Awan, officials said.
Multiple sources, including members of the house, told Sudan Tribune that 12 specialised committees and the positions of the speaker and his deputy were declared vacant following a passage of an urgent resolution calling for immediate dissolution of the house.
No written statement about the dissolution of the house has been released. The Sudan Tribune reporter was not able to independently verify the cause of the dissolution of the people’s house.
However, several officials appear supportive of the decision, reportedly marred with flawed procedures. MPs cited failure of the leadership to unite the house since it was elected as the cause.
They claimed the house has never called and held meetings to bring members together to share thoughts and ideas of how to run the house. Other issues included administrative failure to handle member affairs without involving the third party.
The affected committees include finance, health, education, physical infrastructure, member affairs, security and public order, legal affairs and human rights, gender and social welfare, peace and good governance, among others.
Speaker Aguer Wol Aguer told Sudan Tribune he attempted in vain to convince the house to conduct an organized session during which members would follow all constitutionally required procedure compatible with the Assembly conduct of business regulation.
“It was not an organised voting. It was a rush decision. There was no legal advisor, no observers and the motion itself was not tabled through assembly procedures complying with conduct of business regulation. It was a flawed process, so I decided to walk out with other members because it was unprocedural ”, Aguer told Sudan Tribune on Tuesday.
The lawmaker accused certain quarters he did not name to have engineered parliamentary wrangle in order take advantage.
However, Majang Ngor Kuany, a former speaker who retained his membership after returning to the house following a controversial 2010 April general elections said 22 members voted for the change of leadership while three members, including the speaker, boycotted the poll.
He said the total attendance was 25 members including the speaker and his deputy.
“Actually four members including the speaker walked out after a motion was raised to dissolve the house. The speaker went out with three members but one member returned and signed the paper because he thought the house was only voting to remove the speaker so we became twenty two (22) in total”, Kuany told Sudan Tribune on Tuesday.
He denied that the process had a lot of constitutional defects to nullify the decision of the house.
(ST)