Majority Leader and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu says Ghana's parliament needs people with intellectual ability and not the ones who can pay their way there because they are financially sound.

The Member of Parliament (MP) for Suame constituency in the Ashanti Region speaking at a meet-the-press series in Accra, Wednesday, bemoaned the high level of monetization of the political system and how the situation was affecting the quality of representatives of Ghana’s parliament.

The Majority leader’s comments come on the back of allegations of vote-buying by members of the two leading political parties in the country, the New Patriotic Party and the National Democratic Congress.

A typical example is allegations by the Member of Parliament for Kunbungu, Ras Mubarak, who after the NDC primaries raised concerns of influence of money, especially in his constituency.

This, however, has not been the only instance as the just ended NPP orphan constituencies primaries saw the distribution of cylinders, wellington boots, cutlasses, etc. for the purposes of soliciting votes from delegates.

It is on the back of this and many more instances that Mr. Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu is charging persons given the responsibility to elect MPs to take a second look at the selection process in order to avoid a future possibility of the law-making body being filled with persons who only have money but not the credibility to deliver on the job.

The Minister for Parliamentary Affairs called for the provision of a roadmap which will guide the selection of appropriate persons to represent Parliament in the future.

“I believe that we need to come together to really provide the roadmap to ensure that as a country and as political parties, we conduct primaries that would select appropriate persons to represent the constituencies and represent the institution of parliament and then be able to perform the functions so defined by the constitution as the functions of Members of Parliament

“The meeting discussed did examine the causes and consequences of monetization of politics in Ghana because where we are going if care is not taken parliament may be populated in the foreseeable future by people with fat wallets than people and lean purses who may be very credible, very intellectual, and who may be able to serve the cause of this country may be relegated to footnotes” he said at a meet-the-press meeting in Accra.