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Parliament has passed the Public Holidays (Amendment) bill aimed at  amending the Public Holidays Act, 2001 (Act 601) to provide for the 7th day of January, the 4th day of August and the 21st day of September as additional public holidays and the celebration of 25th May and 1st July as commemorative days.

The bill was passed Tuesday morning after the Interior Minister, Ambrose Derry moved a motion for the Third reading of the bill.

The Minority caucus in line with its decision not to be part of the passage of the bill walked out of the chamber before the Minister of Interior moved the motion.

Immediately the bill was introduced for the 3rd reading and subsequent passage, Minority leader Haruna Iddrisu led his minority members to walk out of the chamber once again.

The minority led by their minority leader, Haruna Iddrisu, who is the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament (MP) for Tamale South, has said that every country has an icon and indicated that Dr Nkrumah was Ghana’s icon and must be recognized as such.

He said even the BBC had recognized Dr Kwame Nkrumah as the African of the Millennium, while his statue had been mounted at the African Union (AU) Headquarters in Ethiopia.

Therefore, he said, any attempt to change the Founder’s status of Dr Nkrumah to have a Founders’ day celebration was an attempt to “deny him the due reverence.”

Mr Iddrisu said anytime there was a change in leadership in the country, that historical anomaly would be corrected and indicated that the frequent changes would not do any good to the country’s image.

He also faulted the government’s decision to celebrate January 7 as a holiday, and indicated that the President and MPs were sworn in on January 7.

He said some people might raise a constitutional matter as to why the President would take an oath on a holiday.

They have however averred to have it changed when they are voted into power.