Millionaire MP Storms Out

Kennedy Agyapong, the multi-millionaire Member of Parliament (MP) for Assin North in the Central Region, yesterday did the unthinkable when he unceremoniously walked out of a live television programme out of anger, saying his views were being suppressed by the host of the programme and his co-panelist. Mr. Agyapong, owner of Kencity Media, was a panelist on E-TV’s early morning newspaper review programme, Breakfast TV, hosted by Bismarck Brown when the incident occurred. The New Patriotic Party (NPP) MP was doing the news analysis at the Asylum Down-based free-to-air commercial television channel with Alfred Agbesi, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) MP for Ashiaman in the Greater Accra Region. Matters came to a head when the host of the programme asked Ken to stick to a specific issue put out for debate, after he (Ken) had referred to former President Rawlings's regime as ‘Jesus Christ and his disciples.’ The topic that generated the controversy was the Daily Searchlight's news report headlined ‘Mills Is Blind…Says Arthur K’, capturing President Atta Mills’s recent pronouncements that Kufuor did nothing for eight years. The Searchlight had quoted Dr. Kobina Arthur Kennedy, a leading member of the NPP, as describing President Mills as politically blind since he could not see the achievements made by ex-President Kufuor. The Assin North MP insisted that he had not passed insulting comments about ex-President Rawlings, after the host had pleaded with him to call the former President by his name and not Jesus Christ. But he (Mr. Agyapong) said he recalled the former President making statements in 1979 and 1980s alluding to himself as such when he seized power. “I am making my analysis and I am building a point. Rawlings, when he came to Ghana, was portraying himself as Jesus Christ so why are you interrupting my comment?” the angry MP asked. Mr. Agbesi, at this point, tried to cut in intermittently, calling on his co-panelist to retract the Jesus Christ description of the NDC founder and not bring JJ Rawlings’s name into the discussion but Mr. Agyapong replied that he (Mr. Agbesi) was not the host to tell him how to behave or what to say on the programme. The Assin North MP then accused both the Ashiaman MP and the host of trying to question his integrity and suppressing his views shouting: “You are questioning my integrity and suppressing my views. “If this continues, I am not going to come on this programme again. If I cannot express my views and you will (continuously) suppress my comments, then you are questioning my integrity,” he fumed. The debate then degenerated, with the panelists trying to outdo each other and Mr. Agyapong was heard saying, "Next time I'm not coming to your show...for me to drive all the way here from Burma Camp for you to just suppress my facts... I have not insulted anybody here." He then asked the host to change the topic: "Change the topic. I'm not going to comment on that (the topic)...I don't want to put up any behaviour over here. If you like, I'll walk out." When the host insisted the topic be exhausted, the erratic MP removed the microphone from his attire, and walked off the set.