DEPUTY SPEAKER MOYO SHOULD STEP DOWN
…. we need sanity in Parliament – Hon Mundubile
Lusaka…. Tuesday December 13, 2022 (Smart Eagles)
Leader of the opposition in Parliament Hon Brian Mundubile has called for the resignation of the Second Deputy Speaker.
Hon Mundubile bemoaned the way presiding officers have been handling Parliamentary proceedings.
The PF presidential hopeful said if the presiding officers would like to go into full time in participating in the debates, they can’t sit in the seat of the presiding officers.
He said when he and other PF MPs addressed the media today that presiding officers in Parliament should resign if they wish to debate in the manner MPs do.
The briefing followed a walkout out of parliament by MPs after the misconduct of the speaker in question.
“As members of Parliament we are not happy with the continued manner at which presiding offers have been handling business of the house. One of the most important functions of the presiding officer is to remain impartial as they handle matters of the house and that when you see presiding officers displaying lack of impartiality as we have seen this evening, it becomes very difficult to continue debating or participating in the business of the house,” he said.
“I believe that members of parliament that fell victim this evening at the hands of the presiding officers will be able to the specific matters that transpired in the house….We will not continue with the way the speaker and deputy speaker have been handling themselves. We are consulting with other party functionalities; we may soon be coming back to the media to demand for the resignation of that speaker because we will not allow that kind of conduct coming from the presiding officers.”
He said the manner in which presiding officers are handling the proceedings in Parliament is affecting Zambians negatively.
“People countrywide are glued to their TVs to try and see how their representatives are representing them in the house. It can’t take a single member in the house in the name of the presiding officer to go against elected members of parliament, mistreat them and he made them to be ridiculed on the floor of the house,” he said.
“The members of parliament sited here are all respected men and women, elected by the Zambian people. Everybody therefore, that has to preside over them has to firstly respect them. They cannot be respected in the manner that we are seeing now. So as members of Parliament we are saying no…The preliminary consultation so far indicate that we may need Hon Moyo, Second Deputy Speaker to resign his position as speaker so that we can have sanity back in the house.”
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