Nuquay’s recusal request trashed

The Plenary of the House of Representatives has overwhelmingly trashed a request for House Speaker Emmanuel James Nuquay’s recusal as head of the Legislature.Plenary, which is the highest decision – making body of the House of Representatives voted in session on Tuesday, 18 July and overwhelmingly threw out the request made by Maryland County Representative Dr. Bhofal Chambers and Montserrado County Representative Acarous Moses Gray.

The Plenary says the Speaker Nuquay recusal request has no constitutional or statutory magnitude and should be treated as though it has never existed before.The two anti – Nuquay lawmakers Rep. Chambers and Rep. Gray appear to be expressing lack of confidence in the ruling Unity Party (UP) vice standard after he was picked by Vice President Joseph Nyumah Boakai as running mate for the October Representatives and Presidential elections.

Dr. Chambers had written the Plenary to seek its endorsement of his request for Speaker Nuquay’s recusal since he is now a vice standard bearer of the governing UP.Rep. Chambers insists that it is best option for the House to ask the speaker to step aside. “Speaker Nuquay, now the vice standard bearer of the ruling Unity Party of which the current Vice President of Liberia Joseph Boakai, is the standard bearer”, Rep. Chambers says.

He argues that Mr. Nuquay should recuse himself from presiding over the Plenary for conscience’s sake and to further avoid the temptation of compromising the interest of the Liberian nation. He specifically expresses fears that Mr. Boakai and Mr. Nuquay could compromise national interest especially in instances where the presiding officers of both Houses have to sit and make decision on critical matters or issues that require independent minds, objectivity and and balance in the best interest of the Liberian people.
Rep. Chambers says it behooves him to act with swiftness and sagacity to protect the sacred institution and the noble state without fear or favor.

Rep. Gray had earlier accused Speaker Nuquay of betraying the trust of those who supported him to be Speaker to take over from dethroned Speaker Alex Tyler. “There is strong distrust in his ability to reunite the legislature and such action demonstrates his administrative ineptitude to run the legislature”, Rep. Gray claims. He argues that Speaker Nuquay specifically promised the Liberian people that he would unite and bring dignity to the Legislature.

But the Montserrado County lawmaker claims that Speaker Nuquay’s action has brought disunity to the Legislature, thus calling for his removal on the basis of administrative ineptitude. “It is not a quest to remove him, but one that is intended to ask him to recuse himself. As someone who has presided over the budget and appointed the presiding officer on the budget, we are afraid that the budget will be tampered with”, Rep. Gray adds. He concludes that Speaker Nuquay’s action is not only destructive and greedy, but one that shows disrespect to his colleagues who stood by him to be speaker.
By E. J. Nathaniel Daygbor–Edited by Winston W. Parley