Ghana’s Legislature has been blamed for failing to take charge of the security of its members.

The Executive Director for the Africa Centre for Parliamentary Affairs, Dr. Rashid Dramani said the gruesome murder of the Abuakwa North Member of Parliament (MP), Joseph Boakye Dnaquah-Adu should be a wake-up call for the MPs.

“I know that there has been a lot of calls for protecting our Members of Parliament and I have heard a lot of media discussions about it today. I would like to put the blame at the doorstep of Parliament itself because every branch of government has to fight for the conditions of service for its members,” he said in an interview with Radio Ghana.

JB Danquah was stabbed to death at his residence at Shiashie in Accra in the early hours of Tuesday.

So far, the Greater Accra Regional Police Command has arrested five persons in connection with the murder.

However, the incident has once again give rise to calls for government to provide better security for MPs.

Dr. Dramani argues that MPs have the authority to make laws in this country “and there is nothing that is off limit for them. You and I cannot go in there and make laws for them so if they need to make any law, a law that I believe is reasonable and a law that a lot of Ghanaians would identify with, I think the ball is in their court.”

He remarked that it is unfortunate the MPs have “waited until the time when such a terrible thing has happened but perhaps, this might be the wake-up call and this might be what will make us in ensuring that our legislators are properly protected.”

“Whatever those in the Executive and other branches get, Parliament should also get that,” he stressed.

Dr. Dramani said it is unfortunate that Ghana as compared to other countries “sometimes trivialize some of these issues and often politicize them.”

“If you go to countries in East Africa, when issues like this happen or there is a national issue that they need to confront, they do it very, very, swiftly but I Ghana, I think we talk more than we act. Maybe the time has come for us as a country to look at this issue very seriously.”