Insecurity And Security Retail: The Ghanaian Experiment

Following the recent gruesome murder of the member of parliament for Mfantseman, the late Ekow Kwansah Hayford, the discussion on the seemingly increasing insecurity in Ghana has gained the attention of those who matter.

This follows other similar high profile murders including those of investigative journalists, Ahmed Hussein-Suale, the Ghana Ports and Harbour Authority boss, Josephine Asante, the director of the Ghana water company, Joseph Miihaai Jakperuk, and professor Benneh of the university of Ghana law school.

All these were great men and women who have contributed tremendously to the development of Ghana in their various professional areas. While we still extend our sincere condolences and sympathise with the families of these great citizens of Ghana, the discourse on the insecurity in Ghana, where armed men brazenly take up arms and for reasons known to them, kill with impunity, continues.

Apparently, the numerical strength of the Ghana Police service is about thirty thousand and out of this number, approximately two thousand police men and women protect political leaders, judges and other key personalities and institutions of state. This leaves about twenty-eight thousand police personnel to protect the over thirty million population of Ghana.

The minister of interior announced yesterday, Tuesday, 13th October, 2020 that all members of the Ghanaian parliament are to be provided with security. While protection for members of parliament is as important as protection for the ordinary citizens who elected them, authorities claim per their risk profiling and analysis, the members of parliament deserve protection to the detriment of the larger population.

The need to discuss this knee jerk reaction and reverse same is as urgent as a national disaster that requires emergency protocols by the president.

Generally, as indicated above, the police to citizen ratio in Ghana is very poor. This is attributed by government to inadequate resources to recruit, train and sustain a large police force in the long term. The question however is who caused this scarcity of the needed resources to recruit and train the police?

Through profligate expenditure, misallocation of resources, corruption, greed and stealing, monies which could have been used to expand the economy, retool our state institutions and develop communities are diverted by the same politicians. This creates unemployment and an obvious increase in social vices. My point is not to endorse crime in anyway or form. I abhor crime. The fact however is that the situation in which we find ourselves (insecurity) is a creature of the politician who now turns to ask us to protect him. Is this not ironical?

Let’s assume that parliament, the executive and the judiciary perform their duties well. That is, parliament make laws that checks the abuse of power by the executive and protects the interest of the citizens without any selfish interests, the executive governs the country positively by creating an enabling environment that makes businesses thrive and reduce the issues of unemployment and classism, the judiciary swiftly administers justice without collecting goats and yams from criminals to set them free as recent investigations reveal, how will our country be like? Your guess is as good as mine.

The Specifics of the guilt of our leaders in creating insecurity in the country and turning around to demand protection from us can be seen in their callous disregard for the very laws they pass, implement and are supposed to guard. Research around the world has shown that most crimes are committed by disbanded or active vigilante groups who use the resources provided by political leaders and activists to terrorize innocent citizens.

In Ghana for example, a mention can be made of the invincible forces, the Azorka boys, Delta force among others which are all creatures of the Ghanaian politician. Tell me which ordinary citizen has formed any of these vigilante groups? The politicians in Ghana are the creators and are responsible for the tooling of these groups and now that they haunt them, they want us to protect them. What a reversal of fortune?

What of the land guards hired by the members of parliament, ministers of state, judges and behind the scene political sponsors to protect their properties? They provide these criminals with guns and when they turn the guns on them, they ask why. Can they not see that they are responsible for their own problem?

Do they create the very means by which they die? If there is a need for security in Ghana, such security should be provided to all Ghanaian citizens. Indeed, a secured Ghana needs no personalized protection. To tell the truth, our members of parliament can have police protecting them all day but if there is general insecurity in the country, they will still not be safe.

Instead of the knee jerk reaction to the general atmosphere of insecurity in the country, the security services in consultation with government, experts, and civil society should dialogue on finding a lasting solution to the problem. It is worth mentioning that we the ordinary citizens also have a role to play. Most of the people who commit these violent crimes live among us. Some of us know them and live with them. We must volunteer information about their activities to the security to enable them to deal with them, for no one is safe in an insecure society.

BIO

Amankwa Benjamin Kwame is a student of English, University of Education, Winneba. He holds a bachelor in Business Administration from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, (pursued at All Nation University). He is also an associate of the chartered institute of marketing, UK. He is a marketer by profession.

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NAME: AMANKWA BENJAMIN KWAME

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