IGP must be neutral in an election year

GHANAWEB reported yesterday 8/2/04 a GNA article titled ?Democracy do not allow disrespect for Presidency -IGP?. I found the statements attributed to the IGP profoundly disturbing. In an election year, especially for one expected to be vigorously contested, I suspect the IGP betrayed impartiality by coming down heavily on the side of Government in his uncompromising support for a redundant Law that in essence indemnifies the President from criticisms.

The Act in question (Section 183A of the Criminal Code Act 29) states ?"Any person who, with intent to bring the President into hatred, ridicule or contempt, publishes any defamatory or insulting matter whether by writing, print, word or mouth or any other manner whatsoever concerning the President shall be guilty of an offense and liable on summary conviction to a fine or to imprisonment not exceeding three years or to both".

The Act is redundant because it is not practically enforceable in the matrix of constitutional guarantees of free speech, nor within the notion of responsible and accountable Government in democracies such as ours. But even if not the case per se, the penalties for violations of the Act make it so. Enforcing the Act as happened last year with respect to Opanin Kusi in Kumasi and the women at Sogakope or threatening to do so when the much maligned NDC itself left the Act mainly dormant is bad politics enough. Worse, coming down in support of the Act raises questions about the impartiality of the IGP in providing a peaceful environment for the forthcoming elections. I return to this theme later but before that the GNA article in question.

In the said article the IGP said : "The democratic dispensation in the country does not arrogate any power to any citizen to say any unholy thing against the President, who is the political father of the land".

My question is : who decides whether an utterance about the President is unholy or not. Should Ghanaians first submit to the IGP before writing or speaking to a public audience?

The IGP said : " -- notwithstanding, the clear-cut interpretation of the Act, the Police had been very cautious in applying the law with the expectation that the public would take note of the Biblical advice that "we should give due respect to our fathers and mothers".

Is the IGP threatening to enforce an Act (protective of the President and stifling of personal criticisms of him) more ruthlessly in an election year? Read on!

The IGP said : "the pen is mightier than the sword" and explained that the sword could be dangerous at short intervals and so was the A.K. 47 assault rifle"

If this is not a threat, I don't know what is. In effect the IGP is saying that even though "the pen is mightier than the sword", there are times when the sword can be made to be mightier than the pen, and in case anyone doubted what he meant he gave us the modern equivalent of such mightier more dangerous sword which can be relied on at short intervals. Yes! you guessed right - the A K 47 assault rifle, ammunition of choice in the Police Force.

The above statement followed the IGP?s advice to newspaper editors thus - "The IGP advised editors of newspapers to ensure that sensational stories were not published since according to him such cheap and unguarded publications contributed to unrests in Liberia, Rwanda, Nigeria, Cote d'Ivoire and other parts of Africa that resulted in the maiming and killing of innocent citizens, some of whom resided in neighboring countries as refugees."

One may ask : what treasonable act(s) or threatened treasonable act(s) provoked our IGP to those levels of threats and blackmail? Any deference to the IGP that he may know things that we ordinary folks do not know, is undermined by his other worry (an increasing Government obsession) which he expressed as follows : " the power of the pen could be more devastating because a publication could reach any part of the world, especially now that Ghana had joined the global age with most news items about the country on the Internet ".

And the IGP was saying all those things to senior police officers, among "representatives of political parties, religious bodies, the media and other stakeholders in Sunyani as part of a working visit to the Brong-Ahafo Region". Truly truly amazing!

The Act on which the IGP commented is not the issue here, it is the level of threat from the chief law enforcement officer in Ghana, at the approach of the business end of electioneering this year. The Act per se is not the issue because statute books are full of laws which are not used because they have passed their use by date. For example one does not expect relevant authorities in one American state to enforce a law still on the statute books that bars sex with lights on. The threat to enforce the Act, given the nature of the Act, has the more serious implications of undermining public trust in the IGP and his Force in supervising a free, fair and peaceful elections.

Successful Law enforcement critically depends on Public trust. Ironically the IGP admitted that much in the following part of the GNA report.

? Nana Owusu-Nsiah asked the public to bear with the Police Service in respect of its problems, saying police personnel number between 15,000 and 16,000 and are expected to cater for about 20 million Ghanaians. He said in view of the limited number of personnel, the police administration had contracted some informants to help the police perform its work. Nana Owusu-Nsiah commended the informants for working effectively with the police leading to the arrest of armed robbers and other criminals.?

Well said! IGP. But if the Force depends so much on public trust and cooperation, why make such overtly partisan comments? Unfortunate indeed because the IGP is reported to have chalked some significant success in that area and needs continuing public support to maintain that success.

It is reasonable to assume that the NPP is hot under the collar with increasing challenges of Government and so becoming increasingly jittery at the approach of the elections. But what Western Democracies do when they are under similar pressures is to assume a cooler more calculating posture. Not so African emerging democracies who tend to overreact and compound problems for themselves.

If that overreaction as exemplified by IGP in the GNA report continues, it would be reasonable to call for an international peace keeping force to supervise the forthcoming elections - elections which in my estimation is more important for our democracy that the 2000 elections - incredible as it may sound. And should a call for such supervision go unheeded, it would be further reasonable to call for the suspension of Ghana from the Commonwealth if the elections prove manifestly fraudulent. I am sure the JAK Government would understand.

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