The Police is a body that represents the civil authority of government responsible for ensuring public order and safety at all times throughout the country.
They work to ensure that, laws are enforced, they act professionally to prevent crime, detect crime and investigate such outcomes through extensive criminal investigations. These functions are policing duties of the Ghana Police Service. Businesses and properties are also provided security by Ghana police service.
The basic function of the Police are stated in Section 1 of the Police Service Act, 1970 (Act 350)
It shall be the duties of the Police Service to prevent and detect crime, to apprehend offenders and to maintain public order and safety of persons and properties.
The Ghana Police Service provides other services to the general public such as Providing Motor Traffic duties aimed at ensuring safety on our roads for road users.
The Ghana Police also vets and issues Police criminal certificates as well as assist females and vulnerable to deal with traumatic and psychological problems emanating from sexual abuse (usually against minors), women and children.
From the above, it is clear that Ghana needs the police officers to be on top of their jobs is we are as a nation going to live in a safe and peaceful environment. The Police Officers in times for robbery and other dangerous criminal occurrences, put their lives on the line. This and other heroic acts of great police officers in the Ghana Police Service cannot be underestimated.
However, police brutality has gone on for long and many innocent persons have suffered ranging from being killed by police officers negligence and stray bullets. In other instances, people have lost their lives because they were mistaken to be criminals on the spot. Other people have been seriously hurt and bedridden through police brutalities.
Human rights activist such as Lawyer Francis-Xavier Sosu and Non-governmental Organizations such as Human Rights Reporters Ghana have expressed worry about the unprofessional policing displayed by some men in uniform while on duty.
Police officers have been found brutalizing unarmed civilians. The Human Rights Reporters Ghana a non-governmental organization aimed at advocacy education, and championing the human rights issues in Ghana and in Africa as a whole has added its voice to the call by Lawyer Francis-Xavier Sosu that, police officers should undertake a course in human rights to arm them with requisite information, knowledge and skills on how to deal with civilians while maintaining law and order so that, they do not end up trampling on the rights of civilians.
Lawyer Francis-Xavier Sosu speaking on the AM Show on Joy News said
Police officers must pass a course in human rights before they are put out there to go and police
The days when police officers want to show the civilian or the lawbreaker where power lies must be over. In a related development, the Trotro Driver and his mate who were captured on a viral video in which they fought an Officer in Uniform have also indicated how they were beaten and maltreated by the Ghana Police since they were arrested.
The two narrating their story on Adom FMs Dwaso Nsem Show said they were beaten, slapped and maltreated by different officers of the law who took turns at the blind side of the law to “punish” them for “beating” another police officer.
The police officer according to the narration was the first to start knocking the driver from behind after he had entered the Trotro. The driver added that the police officer used his helmet to head his mouth and he had to fight back since he realized his life was under threat.
Another police brutality suffered by Latif Iddris of Joy News and other unprofessional conduct of the police amount to human right abuses that many police officers have done have gone unpunished.
Schooling Ghana Police Officers on human rights issues is an urgent call that the police administration must consider going forward. Both officers and new recruits need to be given professional training that will arm them to perform their policing duties effectively.
Source: Newsghana24.com
Pupils of CareGuide Mtonessori School at Gbawe, in Accra, have been sensitised on kidnapping and its related issues to guide them in taking precautions to avoid being victims.
Madam Betty Akumatey, the Director of the School, said kidnapping had been a global phenomenon, which had rocked the nation in recent times.
“Cultural perspective no longer holds and we have become too hospitable to strangers and our children are also very welcoming of strangers and that puts them at risk,” she said.
“We can’t take these things for granted anymore because there are criminals creeping in from various societies and countries, especially with what is happening in Nigeria, having a clang on us in Ghana.”
The sensitization programme was organised in collaboration with the Human Rights Reporters Ghana (HRRG), a non-governmental organisation, which has launched a campaign to fight kidnapping in the country.
The HRRG also campaigns against all forms of violence against women and children including Sexual and Gender-Based Violence, Child Trafficking, and Child Marriage.
Madam Akumatey, who is also a Sociologist, Anthropologist and Gender Expert, advised Ghanaians to be vigilant, be careful of who they trusted, and excise caution in extending the proverbial ‘Ghanaian hospitality’ to strangers.
While acknowledging the Human Rights Reporters for organising the programme for the School, she appealed to other organisations, government agencies and individuals in similar advocacy to collaborate to end the activities of kidnappers in the country.
“This should go on in all social circles, churches and schools, homes, communities, wherever, and above all in the media, especially now that a lot of children are using social media,” she said.
Source: Joseph Kobla Wemakor|Human Rights Reporters Ghana
Human Rights Organization, Amnesty International Ghana(AIG) has launched its 2018 Reports on Death Penalty and Executions with the call on parliament and government to explicitly abolish the death penalty in the constitution for all crimes in Ghana.
The local chapter of the global Human Rights Organization, made up of over 4000 people together with its abolitionist friends and partners have also petitioned parliament among other requests, to support efforts towards ensuring the replacement of death penalty with the death sentence as punishment for crime in the penal code of Ghana.
The launch which preceded the petitioning of parliament was held at the Accra International Press Centre on Wednesday, April 11, 2019.
Present at the event were various dignitaries from embassies in the country, Government Officials, Representatives of UN Organizations, Ghana Police and Prisons Services, Civil Society Groups, Non-Governmental Organizations, Commission of Human Rights and Administrative Justice(CHRAJ), the Ghana Journalists Association(GJA), Human Rights Reporters Ghana(HRRG) including other stakeholders and the general public.
Speaking at the launch, International Member of Amnesty International, Mr. Vincent Adzahlie-Mensah said, “on the occasion of launching this report, we want to take a stand for all death row inmates and to call that their situation be taken into consideration and their cases reviewed as appropriate”.
He described the report as a product of meticulous research that has generated data and is very useful not only for human rights campaigning but to expose issues related to death penalty which academics, the media, policy makers, donor communities including the general public can make use of to speak to the question of death penalty and its abolition.
According to Mr. Adzahlie-Mensah, the 53 pages’ book report depicts a categorization of the world into various regions which highlighted information on the sub-Saharan Africa, vividly captured in page 41 of which Africa is portrayed as doing well on the question of death abolition.
“But for Ghana, it remains a shame, a national shame to us that all countries surrounding us have abolished death penalty and we stand alone line an island”, he stressed.
The Amnesty International Global Report on Death Sentences and Executions give statistics on death sentences and executions carried out around the world. The report identifies countries that have made significant steps towards abolishing the death sentence whilst giving further information methods of execution and so on.
Following a change to its anti-narcotics laws, executions in Iran – a country where the use of the death penalty is rife – fell by a staggering 50%. Iraq, Pakistan and Somalia also showed a significant reduction in the number they carried out. As a result, execution figures fell globally from at least 993 in 2017, to at least 690 in 2018.
China remained the world’s top executioner – but the true extent of the use of the death penalty in China is unknown as this data is classified as a state secret. Amnesty International believes thousands of people are sentenced to death and executed each year.
In an unprecedented move, death penalty figures were made publicly available by authorities in Viet Nam, who reported that at least 85 executions took place in 2018. This tally confirms its place within the world’s top five executing countries: China (1000s), Iran (at least 253), Saudi Arabia (149), Viet Nam (at least 85) and Iraq (at least 52).
This year’s report indicated that Global executions fell by almost one-third, to the lowest figure in at least a decade. The statistics assess known executions worldwide except in China, where figures thought to be in their thousands remain classified as a state secret.
Global trend towards abolition
The Overall, 2018’s figures show that the death penalty is firmly in decline, and that effective steps are being taken across the world to end the use of this cruel and inhuman punishment.
For example, Burkina Faso opted a new penal code that effectively abolished the death penalty in June. In February and July respectively, Gambia and Malaysia both declared an official moratorium on executions. In the US, the death penalty statute in the state of Washington was declared unconstitutional in October.
Death penalty in Ghana and in Africa
Ghana is considered abolitionist in practice by Amnesty International because it retains the death penalty for ordinary crimes such as murder but has not executed anyone in the last 10 years and is believed to have established practice of not carrying out executions.
Although no official moratorium on execution is in place, Ghana has not carried out an execution since 1993 and no President is known to have signed an execution warrant since then. In addition, successive Presidents in the lasts 15 years have granted clemency to death row prisoners. Also, the Constitutional Review Commission (CRC), in its report on 20 December 2011, recommended that the death penalty be abolished under a new Constitution and replaced with life imprisonment without parole.
The Ghana Prisons Service informed Amnesty International that 12 people had been sentenced to death in 2018, and no executions were carried out. At the end of the year, 172 people were under sentence of death, including seven foreign nationals from Benin (1), Burkina Faso (2), Nigeria (3) and Britain (1).
Twenty countries in sub-Saharan Africa have already abolished the death penalty for all crimes, seven of which are in West Africa. In 2018, two countries made significant progress towards full abolition of the death penalty. Burkina Faso abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes in June 2018 when it removed the death penalty from its new Penal Code and the country has included a death penalty abolition clause in a draft new constitution which is yet to be adopted.
On the other hand, Gambia moved closer to fully abolishing the death penalty by entrenching its commitment to abolition. In February 2018, President Adama Barrow announced the establishment of an official moratorium on executions. In September 2018, Gambia ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty.
For his part, Country Director of Amnesty International Ghana(AIG), Robert Akoto Amoafo hinted that it is a clear evidence that all countries in the ECOWAS Sub-Region (for example Togo, Benin, Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso) have made significant progress to either totally abolish the death penalty or have made legal changes towards the total abolishment of the death penalty.
He is convinced that time is right for Ghana to join the league of abolitionist countries in Africa and the world by abolishing the death penalty for all crimes.
Mr. Amoafo therefore appealed to parliament and government to among all others expressly abolish the death penalty in the Constitution for all crimes, commute the death sentence of all death row prisoners to terms of imprisonment and provide all death prisoners, regardless of means, with adequate and effective legal aid to pursue any appeals against their convictions and death sentences.
He has also among other requests called for replacement of death sentences, as punishment for any crime, with prison terms in the Criminal Code and other relevant legislation as well as establishment of an official moratorium on executions.
Ms Jillian Suggate, Second Secretary and Consul at the Australian High Commission, adding her voice to the calls urged countries that practices capital punishment to cease executions and establish a moratorium on the use of death penalty.
She also appealed to governments, including the government of Ghana, to improve prison conditions, including for prisoners on death row.
Death Penalty in Australia
Australia abolished the death penalty in all jurisdictions in 1985, with the last execution occurring in 1967. In 2010, the federal government passed legislation prohibiting the re-establishment of capital punishment by any Australian state or territory. Since that time, Australia has advocated for the abolition of the death penalty across the globe. As a member of the UN Human Rights Council for 2018-20 term, Australia will continue its strong commitment to full abortion.
Justifying the reason why Australia opposes the death penalty in all circumstances, for all people, Ms Suggate said, “Firstly, the death penalty is irrevocable and no legal system is free of error. If the convicted is later found to be innocent, that is miscarriage of justice that cannot be rectified. Secondly it removes any possibility of rehabilitation for the convicted individual. It brutalizes our societies, degrades our citizens, and is an affront to our shared human dignity”.
The Director of CareGuide Montessori School, located at Gbawe, in the Greater Accra Region, Mad. Betty Akumatey has called for government support to help augment various sensitization exercises on kidnapping being organized by some Non-Governmental and Civil Society Organizations in the country as a way of tackling the canker of abduction that has rocked the nation in recent times.
“I think the sensitization must go on from all levels and I believe that this is something that government should throw its weight behind”.
“It should go on in all social circles, churches and schools, homes, communities, wherever, and above all in the media, especially now that a lot of our children are using social media., we should have them sensitized at all fronts”.
Madam Akumatey made this known on the sidelines of a sensitization exercise on kidnapping conducted by the Human Rights Reporters Ghana(HRRG) during their visit to the CareGuide Montessori School, located at Gbawe, in the Greater Accra Region on Monday April 8, 2019.
The exercise which formed part of a campaign by the Human Rights group to rid Ghana of kidnapping issues which has become a phenomenon in recent times saw 250 kids made up of pupils of KG1 up to JHS 3 vigorously sensitized on the modus operandi, tricks, techniques and strategies employ by kidnappers to get their targets.
During the exercise, which was very interactive, the participants had turns to ask mindboggling questions on kidnapping and answers were adequately provided to their satisfaction.
The sensitization exercise was conducted in batches, taking level of the kids into consideration. It was conducted by the able team of HRRG volunteers made up of Nana Owusu Boadu, Beatrice Annan and Benjamin Hallo with support of the HRRG’s Executive Director, Mr. Joseph Kobla Wemakor.
The issue of kidnapping raised its ugly head in Ghana in August last year and continues to wreak havoc without any concrete solution.
The incredible disappearance of seven (7) girls in 2018 among others of which 3 of them from the Western Region are yet to be found still remains a mystery to unravel.
Kidnapping is the act of abducting, seizing or capturing someone and holding him/her captive against the law, and will of the person. While people are kidnapped and killed for rituals, blood money, and other evil motives, others are kidnapped, raped, killed and dumped on the streets.
The act leads to the violation of the freedom and fundamental human rights of kidnapped persons which is a criminal offence.
According to media reports, since invasion of the phenomenon in the country last year, young girls and children of school-going age have become the most affected.
The social issue has caught the attention of Human Rights Reporters Ghana(HRRG), an NGO championing human rights issues in Ghana to sensitize school children and the general public on the activities of kidnappers with the hope that the information will go a long way to help educate, inform and arm the public with strategies to help foil such attempts of kidnappers.
Madam Betty Akumatey, who is also an experienced sociologist, anthropologist and gender expert, in an interview described the issue of kidnapping as global phenomenon, but notes that it is currently taking root in our part of the world.
She therefore advised Ghanaians to be circumspect in extending the proverbial Ghanaian hospitality to strangers, and conscientize children accordingly, so that they don’t assume that everybody is kind.
According to her, that cultural perspective no longer holds, adding, “we can’t take these things for granted anymore because there are criminals creeping in from various societies, countries, especially we know what is happening in Nigeria, you know, It’s having a toll on us”.
“We are too welcoming of strangers and our children are also very welcoming of strangers and that puts them at risk”.
“We should all be vigilant now and not just trust anybody” She stressed.
While patting the Human Rights Reporters Ghana on the back for a good initiative to sensitize school children and the public on the canker, she quickly appealed to other organization and individuals championing similar causes, including government, to collaborate to end the activities of kidnappers in the country.
Source:Ghanaweb.com
