President Akufo-Addo
President Akufo-Addo has commended the various security agencies for ensuring a strict compliance of the imposition of ‘Restrictions Act’ in the fight against the Coronavirus (covid-19) but condemned pockets of abuses that have occurred so far.
“Reports I have received so far indicate that the police, military and other members of our security services have discharged their mandate with considerable professionalism. Furthermore, working with the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, we see personnel of the Ghana Armed Forces involved in the clean-up of our drainage systems and of our markets”, he said in a national broadcast Sunday evening.
The President however expressed disappointment in the actions of a few of them which has become a matter of concern to some Ghanaians.”
“In the very few instances where members of our security agencies have employed the use of excessive force against the citizenry, in enforcing the restrictions on movement”, he admitted, with assurance that “the Inspector General of Police and the Chief of Defence Staff of the Armed Forces have taken steps to investigate such incidents, and, they have given me the assurance that, those found culpable, will be duly sanctioned.”
Thus far, he indicated that “the alleged wrongdoers have been withdrawn from the ongoing exercise. To enhance command and control, more senior officers have been deployed at the operational level, and each member of our security services participating in the exercise has been handed an aide-mémoire highlighting, essentially, the guidelines for the operation.”
He equally expressed extreme disappointment about the actions of a few, unpatriotic persons, who are deliberately passing off and circulating old videos of alleged brutality by members of the security agencies, largely of foreign origin, and presenting them as though they were new incidents by Ghanaian security personnel, which have occurred during the course of this past week.
“It is sad, it is unfortunate, and it must end”, he insisted whiles making a passionate appeal to all and sundry “we should all be in this fight together, and there is nothing to be gained with widespread fabrication and distribution of such videos, whose sole aim is to create discontent, and undermine the trust of the population in the men and women of our security services.”
At a point, President Akufo-Addo could not but asked rhetorically “who gains from such conduct?” whiles hazarding a response “nobody in their right senses!”
To that end, he noted that “the law enforcement agencies are determined to locate the originators of these anti-social acts.”
That, he said was because “all that government is doing is intended to achieve five (5) key objectives – limit and stop the importation of the virus; contain its spread; provide adequate care for the sick; limit the impact of the virus on social and economic life; and inspire the expansion of our domestic capability and deepen our self-reliance.”
At the time, he said 214 cases of the virus had been recorded with the Greater Accra Region alone having 189 cases, followed by the Ashanti Region with twelve (12), Northern Region ten (10), Upper West Region one (1), Eastern Region one (1), and Upper East Region one (1).
The ten from the Northern Region he disclosed were the West African nationals who entered the country illegally, after the closure of the borders.
In total, the President related that “three persons have fully recovered from the disease, 49 persons have been discharged from treatment facilities, and are being managed from home; and the remaining 155 are responding to treatment. Two persons are moderately ill, and five persons, as I said before, have lost their lives.”
“Of the one thousand and thirty (1,030) travellers, who were mandatorily quarantined and tested on their arrival in Ghana on the 21st and 22nd of March, seventy-nine (79) were initially found to be positive, and appropriate arrangements were made for their isolation and treatment”, he said.
Subsequently, President Akufo-Addo indicated that “after twelve (12) further days of quarantine, twenty-six (26) other persons were found to be positive as a result of their second test, bringing the total number of those found to be positive to one hundred and five (105), all of whom have been isolated for treatment.”
“Of the remaining nine hundred and twenty-five (925) persons, who have undergone two tests and found to be negative, eight hundred and four (804) have been released from quarantine to join their families. The remaining one hundred and twenty-one (121) are, as I speak, in the process of being released”, he noted.
He therefore took the opportunity to as it were “thank all of them and their families and loved ones for their understanding and co-operation with the stringent procedures that government was forced to deploy in the public interest.”
By Charles Takyi-Boadu