A private legal practitioner Martin Kpebu has said that the general public should, by now, be on the streets demonstrating against the military brutalities meted out to some civilians in Ashaiman over the killing of a soldier.
He said Ghanaians should be calling for the resignation of the President since he is the Commander-In-Chief of the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF).
“By now we should have been on the streets that the President should resign,” he said on the Key Points on TV3 Saturday, March 11.
“What the Military did was not a swoop, it was a mob justice, it was vengeance, not a swoop.,” he stressed.
“There must be reasonable suspicion before you swoop,” he added.
He further indicated that per Article 2(10), the Military “had no business going there to unleash this mayhem.”
Martin Kpebu further expressed condolence to the family of the killed soldier.
A Professor at the University of Ghana Ransford Gyampo, for his part, cautioned the public against attacking soldiers or Police officers at the slightest provocation.
Contributing to a discussion on the Military brutalities at Ashaiman following the killing of a solder Imoro Sherrif, on TV3’s Key Points Saturday, March 11, he said the impression should not be created that at any time the Police or the military can be attacked.
When that is done “then we are finished” he said, adding that he was not rationalizing the excesses.
He further indicated elsewhere, “if you attack soldiers this is how they respond.”
Imoro Sherrif’s body was found in a pool of blood near the Amania Hotel in Ashaiman and suspected of having been stabbed to death.
The Military High Command on Tuesday sanctioned an intelligence-led operation to fish out the perpetrators of the crime.
In the course of the operation, several civilians reported brutalities meted out to them.
A Security Expert, Professor Kwesi Aning criticized the Military Command for how the brutalities meted out to some civilians at Asahiman by some men in uniform were handled.
According to him, the response by the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) in their statement was rushed, and not thought through.
In his view, the reaction of the GAF undermined their own credibility.
Speaking on News 360 on TV3 Thursday, March 9, Professor Aning who is also the Director, the Faculty of Academic Affairs & Research, Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, said “The bigger challenge in the failure is that Parliament has not spoken, and the Parliamentary Committee on Defence and Interior, with a deputy who was former personnel from the Ghana Police Service, ought to show leadership and that leadership is lacking.
“The Deputy Defence Minister, as I have said earlier, has shown political maturity and humility by saying, look, there were some unfortunate excesses but it is Parliament, particularly the Committee on Defence and Interior, that needs to invite the people who did the planning to come and answer some tough questions and to reassure the public post that conversation that we have learned these lessons, those who carried out the excesses will also be dealt with.
“The Military tells us that it was an intelligence-led operation or that they used intelligence and were targeted. I think the series of explanatory statements coming from the army itself has been unfortunate. When you read the press release carefully and you do a discourse analysis of the release, it was hastily put together, it wasn’t thought through and undermines this credible and creditable institution.”
GAF confirmed Tuesday’s operation in Ashaiman in the Greater Accra Region by some officers, saying the exercise was sanctioned by the Military High Command.
It said it was an intelligence-led operation conducted to fish out the killers of a military officer and not to avenge the killing.
The Police after a week of sustained intelligence-led operation has arrested the key suspects involved in the murder of Imoro Sherrif.
“This is solely police intelligence work,” the Police said in a short statement on Friday, March 10.
