"Train police officers to stop arresting people for civil issues" -Joseph Naah-Yerreh to GPS

A Ghanaian political commentator and Editor at Ghanatribune has admonished the leadership of the Ghana Police service to retrain their officers on what constitutes a criminal case and a civil one.

He says some police officers in the past have wrongfully arrested people for offences that are civil in nature, either due to ignorance or that they were influenced by money from the person reporting the case.

Taking to social media, Joseph Naah-Yerreh, better known as Dada Joe cited a recent case of two bloggers being "arrested" by the Police Service for allegedly publishing an unsubstantiated story about Ghanaian musician Stonebwoy.

Their arrest was caused by Stonebwoy's lackey, Aisha Modi who bragged about it on social media.

Mr. Naah-Yerreh who made it clear that he was against the practice of publishing false and unsubstantiated news, said the arrest of the two Bloggers, Gideon Ofori and Razak was unlawful. Similarly, another blogger, Ohemaa Candace was arrested and embarrassed on national TV (UTV) in cuffs for a similar accusation in November 2018.

He explained that the criminal libel law was repealed in 2001, a move led by Ghana's incumbent president, Nana Akufo-Addo who was then the Attorney General, therefore issues of libel fall under the aegis of civil tort.

He, therefore, advice the leadership of the Ghana Police service to ensure that as law enforcers, their officers know the law, educate and direct people who report issues that are civil in nature on what to do to seek redress.

"Dear Ghana Police Service, Kindly train your officers at the CID to know the difference between a civil issue and a criminal one. If a publisher writes a story which the subject thinks is false, that's a civil issue not criminal. For God's sake the criminal libel law has been repealed, led by our current president Nana Addo when he was the Attorney General." he wrote.

Source: Ghanatribune.com