Soldiers Take To Streets

The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) will this morning engage in an unusual route march which the high command has dubbed 'mechanized route march.'

Joining the troops in the multi-pronged march are detachments from the other security services.

The march is unusual because it is emanating from multiple points across the nation's capital. Soldiers and the police will in particular display their newly acquired equipment thought to have been acquired recently for the purpose of instilling fear in the electorate ahead of the December 7 polls.

DAILY GUIDE learnt that the exercise is an orchestration to instill fear in the people as a means of subduing their will.

The military's press release on the subject states that the march is meant to showcase the preparedness of the security services to maintain law and order during the elections – a claim that has been disputed by some concerned Ghanaians.

Coming against the backdrop of apprehension that the government wants to control the outcome of the forthcoming polls, the so-called mechanized route march is being regarded as tendentious and would be sneered at by political observers as the spectacle is watched by most residents of Accra.

According to the press release announcing the march, “The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) will this morning, in conjunction with other security services, embark on a mechanized route march in the Greater Accra Region.

Signed by its Deputy Director of Information and Press Relations for the Director of Public Relations, Col Aggrey Quarshie, the release explained that the purpose for the march is to showcase the preparedness and commitment of the security services to ensuring a peaceful environment during the elections.

It indicated that the exercise will commence and end at the Independence Square.

“All vehicles will converge at 0500 hrs and then disperse to their starting points. The convoys will start and traverse the routes,” GAF said in the statement.

It gave the routes for the march as: Weija-Kaneshie – Jamestown – Atta Mills Highway, Ablekuma –N1 – Ring Road – Independence Square, Tema Newtown Community 3 – T' Junction – Osu, Afienya – Ashiaman – Spintex Road – 37 Mil Hosp – Ridge Roundabout. Ayi Mensah–Tetteh Quarshie Interchange – EI Wak Osu Oxford Street, Dodowa–Adenta – Mile 11 K' Nkrumah Interchange – Ministries, Nsawam – Ofankor – Achimota – 37 Mil Hosp – La-Danquah Circle – Osu.”

At the end of the march, the troops would expectedly be addressed by the military high command.

“Ghanaians are so obsessed with getting free and fair polls that such route marches would hardly instill the level of fear the military authorities and the government seek to achieve,” a top politician underscored.

BY Melvin Tarlue