Treason means treason?

Yes, unless in substance the act is not treason

1. At a time when the public mood is perhaps best placed to question what has happened to Ghana when some tomato sellers in Accra won’t even sell tomatoes to their customers (because the price was too high at the market); headlines are blazed with the Inspector General of Police’s 15 questions to the High Commissioner of the U.K, Ms. Harriet Thompson.

2. Akuffo Dampare’s concise list went from publicly schooling the young-looking diplomat on the conduct of diplomats (as emphasized in the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961) to redirecting her to the supposed “innovation” being introduced by the Ghana Police Service as they deepen discipline in a country that is perhaps feeling the pinch of inflation a little too tightly.

3. And then there is the subject matter that leads to both publications; Cambridge educated Oliver Mawuse Barker-Vormawor’s Facebook post on the E-Levy Bill. He is of course the convener of the popular #fixthecountry movement who himself is facing the more serious felony charge of treason for this online comment. He was arrested in February of this year following a post he allegedly made on a social media platform to the effect that he would stage a coup himself if the E-Levy Bill was passed by Parliament.

4. However offensive Vormawor’s comments might be, particularly if one was suffering under a ruling monarch, the truth remains that we are not ruled by an active monarch in Ghana but a democracy that is the cradle of all democracies in Africa. One where our own leader enjoyed the freedoms of campaigning during his youth for causes dear to his heart and be remembered for challenging the system as much as one could in the 1980s whilst fighting for the rights of those who couldn’t.

Online Pulpits

5. Our pulpits these days are often on Facebook and Twitter; where we sit behind our laptop screens in the quietness of our thoughts freely publishing our views on everything from public policy to how our day went.

6. This case before the court tests the boundaries of freedom of speech and its opposite; words that are so allegedly offensive; can be deemed to be treasonable.


Ghana’s 1992 Constitution

7. Ghana’s 1992 Constitution clearly spells out what actions constitute treason. However, based on the comment by Barker-Vormawor, there is no indication that his comment, however offensive, comes close to being considered treasonable.

8. At best the initial misdemeanor charge by the prosecution of offensive conduct conducive to breach of the peace may have been warranted (as a charge that still needed to be answered), yet that was quickly escalated to the rather serious felony charge of treason.

9. Enshrined under Chapter 5 of the 1992 Constitution are fundamental human rights and freedoms where the right to a fair trial further qualifies the fact that: "treason shall consist ONLY

(i) in levying war against Ghana or assisting any state, or person or inciting
or conspiring with any person to levy war against Ghana; or

(ii) in attempting by force of arms or other violent means to overthrow the
organs of government established by or under this Constitution; or

(iii) in taking part or being concerned in or inciting or conspiring with any
person to make or take part or be concerned in, any such attempt. (Article 19, clause 17).

10. The fact that our Constitution went to such lengths to qualify the only circumstances treason can be committed in this country; forever protects us, mere citizens, from being publicly charged when we don’t fall under any of those laid down guidelines as defined by the constitution.

11. When youthful exuberance and reflective musings contained in one’s short online post can somehow be elevated to a charge of full-blown treason; we can only commend the framers of our Constitution who looked so far down the road of time and envisaged a situation where something like published musings would be considered levying an all-out war on Ghana; full-blown incitement and perhaps even attempting by force of arms or other violent means to overthrow the organs of government.

12. Time will tell if a Facebook post couched in words reflective of public policy is capable of inciting full-blown sudden, violent, and illegal seizure of power from a government; or whether Barker-Vormawor was simply exercising his freedom of speech; which, if considered in an extremely poor taste, warranted the original charge Barker-Vormawor faced, offensive conduct conducive to breach of the peace.