Accra, Ghana, May 9, 2019//-The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Council of Elders has pounced on the Akufo-Addo-led government over harassment and intimidation in the lead up to country’s Presidential and Parliamentary elections.
Alhaji Mahama Iddrisu, veteran politician and Chairman of the Council of Elders of the NDC, Ghana’s largest opposition party insisted that the recent police invitation of the NDC National Chairman, Samuel Ofosu Ampofo was just a way to harass and intimidate the party.
He told journalists in Accra: “This latest invitation, in our view, is yet another case of intimidation and harassment being employed by the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo Government, using the instrumentality of the Police, to instil fear in our Chairman and supporters of our party and to suppress dissenting voices in the country”.
Below is his unedited press statement
PRESS STATEMENT BY ALHAJI MAHAMA IDDRISU ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC CONGRESS (NDC) COUNCIL OF ELDERS ON THE HARASSMENT AND INTIMIDATION OF THE NATIONAL CHAIRMAN OF THE NDC
9TH MAY 2019
Ladies and Gentlemen of the Media,
Let me on behalf of the Council of Elders of the NDC thank you and welcome you to this brief media encounter.
The attention of our party has been drawn to an invitation from the Director- General of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service, Commissioner of Police (COP) Mrs. Tiwaa Addo-Danquah, inviting our National Chairman, Honourable Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo, a former Cabinet Minister, a former Regional Minister, a former Member of Parliament and a former District Chief Executive, to report to her at the CID Headquarters today, Thursday 9th May 2019 at 2.00 p.m. She states the grounds for the invitation in her letter as follows:
“The Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service has commenced investigations into cases of kidnapping and fire outbreaks in various parts of the country.
Intelligence gathered indicates that some of these kidnappings and fire outbreaks are being orchestrated by various unidentified groups, persons and individuals.
Some of the persons picked up for interrogation and investigation have mentioned your name as part of a grand scheme designed to cause fear and panic in the country”.
This latest invitation, in our view, is yet another case of intimidation and harassment being employed by the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo Government, using the instrumentality of the Police, to instil fear in our Chairman and supporters of our party and to suppress dissenting voices in the country.
A few months ago, the Police, based on a supposed leaked tape, invited the same National Chairman of our party for questioning. Subsequent to that invitation, charges were brought against him and our Deputy Communications Officer, Mr. Kwaku Boahen, for which they are currently appearing before court.
Owing to the pendency of the matter before the court, we will refrain from commenting directly on the merits of the case. Suffice it to say that we consider the decision of the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo Government to prosecute our officials as malicious and intended to frustrate the work of the NDC and its mobilization towards the 2020 elections.
The intimidation has been taken a notch higher with yesterday’s invitation from COP Mrs. Mrs Tiwaa Addo-Danquah on the outrageous basis that “some persons picked up for interrogation and investigation in connection with kidnapping and fire outbreaks” have told the police that our National Chairman is involved in these nation-wrecking activities.
Look at the positions our National Chairman has held since the beginning of the Fourth Republic and ask yourselves whether this is the kind of person who will involve himself in such activities.
We dismiss this claim as a sinister fabrication and lie, conjured up by the Police CID and it’s Director-General at the instigation of the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo- Addo Government.
This has been done to divert attention from the growing lawlessness and violent crimes in our country which stems directly from the inability of the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo Government to fashion out a robust security policy that guarantees the safety of Ghanaians.
Ladies and Gentlemen of the Media
We are appalled that COP Mrs. Tiwaa Addo-Danquah, a professional police officer who has risen so high as to be promoted to the rank of Commissioner of Police and appointed Director-General of the CID, has allowed herself to be pushed into such an openly partisan position and the peddling of such a wicked lie against our National Chairman.
Mrs. Tiwaa Addo-Danquah’s credibility was recently brought into question when she publicly announced that the CID knew the whereabouts of the three kidnapped Takoradi girls. Since she mentioned herself, has she invited herself for questioning as she is inviting our National Chairman?
More than a month after that announcement, there are no signs of the girls and she has provided no further information about their whereabouts.
These irresponsible acts of the Government and the Police have the potential to undermine our democracy and drag down the hard-won reputation of our country as the beacon of multi-party democracy and good governance in Africa.
We note with deep concern that for the first time since the advent of the Fourth Republic about 26 years ago, critical voices of dissent have either been assassinated or forced to go into exile to protect their lives.
While we remain committed to assisting the security agencies in any way we can to promote law and order, we will not look on docilely whilst our leaders are harassed in a bid to muzzle us as the largest opposition party.
The position of the NDC which we the elderly members of the party’s Council of Elders have been reluctantly forced to endorse because of the times we are in, is very simple.
Enough is enough. We have had enough of the vile intimidation and fatuous threats. The NDC will not be muffled or unnerved by a Police CID Director- General who has shown by all her actions to be a partisan and unabashed supporter, nay member, of the NPP.
Our National Chairman is not under any compulsion or obligation to assist the police in their investigations and the NDC will not allow him to honour that vexatious invitation.
He has no assistance to render the CID as far as this matter is concerned. After all, was it not on Wednesday 2nd September 2015 that Mr. Freddie Blay, then First Vice Chairman of the NPP and now Chairman of the party, refused an invitation by the CID to assist in investigations? What did the CID in that era of the NDC Government do to him? What did the NDC Government itself do to him?
If the CID wishes to arrest our National Chairman, they can proceed to do so. We call on all our members to show solidarity with our National Chairman in these difficult times and to ensure that his freedom and liberty is not jeopardized by any of the vigilante forces that are at the disposal of this Government.
We have taken note that the Government’s policy of harassment has not been restricted to our National Chairman alone. It has extended to our former Ministers and former appointees. In the circumstances, we consider it no longer prudent for our former Ministers and appointees to cooperate in the numerous inquisitions going on into its period in government.
In particular, our former Ministers and appointees will no longer answer questions before the numerous inquisition panels and bodies established to harass and persecute them; neither will they respond to the numerous intrusive and oppressive questionnaires administered to them.
Ladies and Gentlemen of the Media,
The living conditions of the ordinary Ghanaian are getting worse. What is needed is a conscious effort to determine the choices we have to make for our survival and sustainable development.
This is what Ghanaians expect of their political leaders and representatives, not political retribution and witch-hunting, harassment and humiliation. The Akufo-Addo administration appears more to be preoccupied with showing off its political power than creating a congenial atmosphere for national unity and development.
The media, as the Fourth Estate of the Republic, has a special responsibility to ensure that there is a viable and virile opposition so that democracy thrives, for any attempt to annihilate the opposition, in particular the NDC, with a view to creating a de facto one-party state, will be dangerous for the country.
The witch-hunting, the harassment, the humiliation and the undercover assault on the freedom and dignity of the NDC in particular and the opposition in general, could well turn out to be the Achilles Heel of the Nana Akufo-Addo Government for as has been said, “where there is no justice, there is no peace”.
I thank you very much for your presence and for your attention.
African Eye Report
