By Nadia Ntiamoah
A fresh political and constitutional controversy has emerged within the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) following President John Dramani Mahama’s attempt to communicate the nomination of Builsa North Member of Parliament James Agalga as Acting Majority Leader of Parliament.
The development has triggered concerns about the boundaries between the powers of the Presidency, the NDC’s internal party structures and the parliamentary Majority Caucus. Former Attorney-General and former Special Prosecutor Martin A.B.K. Amidu, in a commentary dated August 25, 2026, argues that the President’s action amounted to an attempt to exercise a function that belongs to the parliamentary caucus and the party’s leadership rather than the executive branch.
The controversy began after a Ghana News Agency report published on August 24, 2026, stated that President Mahama had nominated James Agalga, the NDC MP for Builsa North, to serve as Acting Majority Leader.
According to Amidu, the announcement immediately raised questions about whether the Presidency had crossed the constitutional and parliamentary boundaries governing the selection of Majority leadership.
At the centre of the dispute is the distinction between the President as leader of the NDC in government and the separate constitutional and organisational structures through which the party operates. Amidu maintains that although a President elected on the ticket of the NDC becomes the political leader of the party while in office, that position does not automatically confer authority over the elected national executives of the party or the Majority Caucus in Parliament.
The Standing Orders question
Amidu’s central argument rests on Parliament’s Standing Orders, 2024. He points specifically to Order 6, which defines the Majority Leader as a Member of Parliament designated by the Majority Caucus as its leader in the House. The same provisions define a caucus broadly as a group of Members belonging to the same political party or parties, among other groupings, who share a common cause.
From that framework, Amidu argues that the authority to determine the Majority Leader does not originate from the Office of the President. Instead, it is connected to the parliamentary Majority Caucus and the relevant party structures.
He also draws attention to Orders 65 and 66 of Parliament’s Standing Orders, which govern communications between the President and the House. Under Order 65, he notes, communication from the President to Parliament is to be made to the Speaker in writing and signed by the President, or in specified circumstances by the Vice-President or an authorised Minister.
According to the commentary, Order 65 identifies specific areas in which the President may communicate with Parliament, including ministerial and deputy ministerial nominations. Amidu argues that the nomination of an Acting Majority Leader does not fall within those listed presidential functions.
He therefore questions why the Presidency chose to write formally to the Speaker nominating Agalga for the parliamentary leadership position rather than allowing the appropriate party and parliamentary structures to communicate the decision.
Speaker rejects presidential nomination
The controversy took another turn when, according to Amidu, Speaker Alban Bagbin rejected the President’s letter on the grounds that it was inconsistent with Parliament’s Standing Orders. Amidu interprets the Speaker’s intervention as an attempt to prevent a constitutional and parliamentary procedural dispute from escalating.
The situation was subsequently clarified by the NDC itself.
In a letter dated August 24, 2026, and referenced NDC/HQ/73/045, the party’s General Secretary formally informed the Speaker that, following consultations between the NDC leadership and the Presidency, James Agalga had been appointed as the new Majority Leader of Parliament.
That communication effectively shifted the emphasis from a presidential nomination to a party-backed appointment following consultations between the relevant political structures.
For Amidu, however, the distinction is significant. He argues that there is a fundamental difference between the NDC and its Majority Caucus selecting Agalga to lead the parliamentary Majority and the President personally purporting to nominate him as Acting Majority Leader.
Who is James Agalga?
James Agalga is not a newcomer to the NDC’s parliamentary leadership structure. According to Amidu’s account, Agalga has served as the Member of Parliament for Builsa North since January 2013 and served as Deputy Minister of the Interior. During the NDC’s period in opposition, he was also the party’s ranking member on the Defence and Interior Committee for eight years.
His parliamentary and regional political profile also predates the NDC’s return to government in the 2024 elections. Amidu recalls that Agalga participated in political strategy meetings involving NDC members from the Upper East Region ahead of the December 7, 2024 elections and was at the time the caucus leader of MPs from the region.
The circumstances surrounding Agalga’s elevation have therefore become part of the broader political debate.
Amidu points out that after President Mahama returned to power on January 7, 2025, Agalga was not selected for a ministerial appointment. Instead, the NDC parliamentary leadership considered him suitable for the chairmanship of Parliament’s Defence and Interior Committee.
That history, Amidu argues, raises questions about whether Agalga’s subsequent elevation should be portrayed as a presidential appointment or as a decision of the NDC and its parliamentary structures.
A wider battle over party power?
Beyond the immediate parliamentary dispute, Amidu places the Agalga controversy within a larger struggle over the future direction and control of the NDC.
The party has already entered its internal electoral cycle, with branch-level elections and subsequent stages eventually leading toward the national leadership structure. Against that background, Amidu suggests that questions about who exercises influence over the party could become increasingly important as preparations for the 2028 elections gather momentum.
His argument is that the Presidency and the NDC, although closely connected by the party’s control of government, are not institutionally identical.
President Mahama contested the 2024 presidential election as the NDC’s candidate, and the party’s organisational machinery played the role of providing the political platform through which he returned to the presidency. But Amidu insists that occupying the Presidency does not place the President above the party executives elected through the NDC’s congress structures.
The disagreement therefore goes beyond the identity of the next Majority Leader. It raises a larger question about where executive presidential authority ends and party and parliamentary authority begins.
NDC’s institutional identity under scrutiny
Amidu’s criticism also draws heavily on the historical origins of the NDC.
He recalls that the party emerged from meetings held in April and May 1992 under the co-chairmanship of the late Justice D. F. Annan and the late Captain Kojo Tsikata, before subsequently being registered as a political party during the period when Jerry John Rawlings was Chairman of the PNDC.
For him, that history reinforces the argument that the NDC should not be treated as an extension of the sitting President’s office.
The present dispute, therefore, has become a test of the institutional independence of the party’s structures at a time when the NDC controls both the Presidency and the parliamentary Majority.
Amidu contends that the party must preserve its organisational identity even when its presidential candidate occupies the highest executive office in the country. In his view, the President’s position as leader of the NDC while in government cannot override the authority of party executives elected at Congress or the parliamentary procedures governing the Majority Caucus.
The bigger constitutional question
The controversy ultimately turns on whether the President’s letter was merely a political communication reflecting an internal agreement or an exercise of constitutional authority that the President does not possess.
The subsequent NDC communication to the Speaker appears to have sought to resolve the immediate procedural problem by presenting Agalga’s appointment as the outcome of consultations between the party leadership and the Presidency. But Amidu argues that this does not erase the significance of the original presidential communication.
He maintains that the public should distinguish between the constitutional role of the President, the organisational authority of the NDC and the parliamentary authority of the Majority Caucus.
That distinction is likely to remain politically significant as the NDC moves closer to its 2028 electoral contest.
