The unprovoked brutality meted out to a dozen or so students, assemblymen and some executive officers of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) at the Police Headquarters last Wednesday was uncivil and suggestive of portentous days ahead.
They had gone there to seek bail for the detained and arm-dislocated Luqman Abubakar, National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS) President-elect.
Ghanaians by the action of the law enforcement agents acting upon the dreadful‘ order from above’ and under the noses of the headquarters management board have cause to forget about expecting to be protected by the Police in the face of election-related violence.
It is scandalous to think that an order can be given to a special squad put in place to assault persons disliked by the political establishment: that is a fact and the earlier the law enforcement system knows that we know this, the better it would be for them.
We now understand why the recorded incidents of mayhem in some parts of the country-Kukuom and Suhum- did not attract any marked police response and the known culprits nowhere near being arraigned. Those who are on the verge of giving up on Ghana have a point but we should be quick to ask them to join all well-meaning compatriots in condemning the act of hooliganism from police officers and to stand up for change in the political establishment.
What unfolded last Wednesday evening at the Police Headquarters is a pointer at the game-plan of the law enforcement agency in dealing with so-called politics-related issues and above all to be unambiguously on the side of the ruling party.
As for the rule of law and humanness, they have never been so threatened in recent times; we can only shed tears for this country and pray for better days.
A Superior Police Officer reportedly said since no blood was oozing from Luqman’s body he was not going to heed the demand that he be sent to hospital. If this is the quality of police personnel at the superior officer level, then the Ghanaian ailment has gone past the notch we thought it was.
The narration regarding the assault on the young students and assemblymen who went to the Police Headquarters to seek bail for the said Luqman Abubakar was harrowing.
A blank cheque for personnel outside the police headquarters to brutalise those they are supposed to protect has been delivered cut and dry and it is up to all Ghanaians to stand up and be counted on the side of those who demand sanity and civility in policing in this country: we want the restoration of orderliness in the law enforcement system.
We abhor a police system that supports the ruling party and not the state. Doing so hook, line and sinker cannot be tolerated indefinitely, we dare state, and history is replete with myriad lessons for those obsessed with power.
When divisional and district commanders in the regions turn their eyes away from people being beaten by ruling party rogues be they men or women, the reason is that there has been a subtle order that such cases should be ignored.
At the time of completing this editorial, the whereabouts of Luqman Abubakar was still unknown. We wonder whether the government and the Police want the young man to die considering his deteriorated state of health.
There are very good and professional police men and superior officers who would not brook the nonsense that is going on in the Police Service. They are sulking but with nothing they can do about the rotten system in which they find themselves in, they can only watch and pray.
We have said it before and would repeat it for the umpteenth time: when a law enforcement system is saddled with persons who should have gone on retirement five years ago at the top of the hierarchy because their stay inures to the interest of the President, the outcome is what is unfolding. Such persons close their eyes to their notes and ethics of the profession of policing. How sad!
Where is the compassionate President who ordered the release of the Montie 3 from prison after they had been jailed for contemptuous conduct against the Supreme Court? Selective compassion.