When was Kwesi Pratt named IGP?

Would the Managing-Editor of the so-called Insight newspaper take marching orders, or professional instructions, from the top leadership of the Ghana Police Service (GPS) on how to run his rag? So why is Mr. Kwesi Pratt allegedly lambasting the leaders of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service, for allegedly having detained Mr. Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo, the National Chairman of the country’s main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), for some five hours? And on the latter count, we need to quickly point out the fact that the former Eastern Regional Minister had earlier on been reportedly invited by the top-brass of the GPS to appear at the Police Headquarters for questioning, an invitation that, we are told, Mr. Ofosu-Ampofo either rudely and/or flatly refused to honor or nonchalantly disregarded (See “Leaked Tape: Kwesi Pratt Lambasts CID for Holding Ofosu-Ampofo for Hours” Peacefmonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 3/6/19).

The invitation of the National Chairman of the NDC, we are told, had to do with a leaked audiotape on which the voice of Mr. Ofosu-Ampofo was clearly heard allegedly plotting with some of his party’s associates to destabilize the country, as well as harass and character-assassinate the Electoral Commissioner, Mrs. Jean Odukwei Mensa, as a surefire means of making the Akufo-Addo-led government of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) widely unpopular, thereby ensuring that come Election 2020, the thoroughgoing corrupt Mahama Posse would be afforded the highly unlikely electoral mandate to return to power and continue with their infamous wanton exploitation of the Ghanaian taxpayer and to shamelessly further the rapid regression of Ghana’s socioeconomic, technological, political and cultural development.

You see, what most matters here has far less to do with how long Mr. Ofosu-Ampofo allegedly spent at the Police Headquarters than the dire implications of the contents of the allegedly leaked tape. This very likely played a major role in the decision by the top leadership of the GPS to keep the NDC’s National Chairman for some five hours. Indeed, as of this writing, it had been reported by the local media that Mr. Ofosu-Ampofo and some two other prominent members of the National Democratic Congress had been charged with some unspecified acts of criminality. Very likely, such charges include attempting to disturb the public peace, at the very least. We need to also recall the lurid attempt by some party stalwarts to stampede police investigators by swamping the Police Headquarters with their numbers, as they had routinely done in the past.

We must also underscore the fact that as a notoriously shameless “Stomach Journalist,” Mr. Pratt has absolutely no credibility whatsoever, especially when it comes to holding brief for the key operatives of the National Democratic Congress, on whose payroll he has been widely known to have been listed for quite a considerable while now. Mr. Pratt, together with his good friend, clansman and media associate, Mr. Ben Ephson, Jr., and a platoon of others, have also been known to have been regular recipients of free auto-fuel under governments of the National Democratic Congress, in exchange for doing propaganda work, in the recent past, for Messrs. John Evans Atta-Mills, late, and John Dramani Mahama.

Lack of credibility aside, it is this kind of obnoxious heckling of our law-enforcement authorities by perennial media fixtures like Mr. Pratt that is making it extremely hard for the police to perform their work effectively and efficiently. Even so, the Managing-Editor of the Insight newspaper makes a politically critical observation of the facile and unprofessional use of the institution of the Ghana Police Service as a vindictive coercive tool by whichever of our two major political parties that happens to be in power. Maybe this is the main reason that made Mr. Pratt knee-jerkily impugn the motive behind the five-hour detention of the NDC’s National Chairman at the CID Headquarters of the Ghana Police Service recently.

Such heckling is, nevertheless, uncalled for, especially since we have also been informed that the reason or reasons for which Mr. Ofosu-Ampofo was invited to the Greater-Accra Headquarters of the Ghana Police Service may be one that involves a heinous act of criminality. Playing the nauseatingly routine game of “equalization,” as Mr. Pratt, a well-known NDC propaganda shill, did recently, does a diddly little to facilitate the improvement in the quality of law enforcement and the unfettered ministration of justice in the country and must be promptly stopped.

*Visit my blog at: kwameokoampaahoofe.wordpress.com Ghanaffairs

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., PhD

English Department, SUNY-Nassau

Garden City, New York