Editorial: This Is Not Good Enough

Later this month, the mortal remains of Nii Amugi, the man who, until his death, had been the king of the Ga people, would be finally laid to rest.

The Ghanaian Lens hopes that with the burial of the late king, the divisions and rancour that have been existing in the Ga Traditional Council as a result of selecting a successor to the late king would also be laid to rest.

The Ga Traditional Council, in outlining the programme for the burial an d observance of the funeral rites of the late king, placed a ban on other funeral activities in the Ga traditional area during the period that the funeral of the late king would be taking place.

The Traditional Council went further to issue a directive to all mortuaries in the traditional area not to release dead bodies to their relatives during the period.

While we on The Ghanaian Lens have very little difficulty with the ban on all other funeral activities in the traditional area during the funeral of the late king, so as to give him a befitting burial and funeral, we can not find any justification whatsoever for the directive issued by the Ga Traditional Council to mortuaries in the traditional area not to release dead bodies to their relatives during that period.

It is our view that this directive is only too sweeping, but it lacks any legal or even moral basis. Indeed, being a nation that is supposed to be governed by law and not by the whims and caprices of any person or body, one wonders which of the nation’s laws gives the Ga Traditional Council the powers to issue such a sweeping directive.

The directive fails to take into account the fact that some of the families who may be desirous of collecting the dead bodies of their relatives may not necessarily be burying them within the Ga traditional area or even performing the funeral rites within the jurisdiction.

Obviously, this directive has the propensity of causing needless inconvenience to families who have no intention of burying their dead relatives in the Ga traditional area or even performing their funeral in the jurisdiction, and one would have expected that the officers of state who have been given the mandate to govern the affairs of this country would have acted swiftly to stop this illegality.

Alas, all that is emanating from officialdom in response to this is a shockingly loud silence. This is not good enough.

There is no doubt that this directive from the Ga Traditional Council sets a very bad precedence that must not be allowed to stand. But officialdom more mindful, as always, of the political consequences rather than ensuring that the rule of law prevails, rather prefers to play the ostrich and pretend that it is not aware of this.

One gets the impression that officialdom is holding back until an aggrieved person challenges the directive in a court of law.

But, surely, this is not be the way to govern, because the fact nobody challenges such a directive now does not necessarily mean that it is legal and just; and it being the responsibility of our elected government to uphold the rule of law, there can be no justification for the government holding back until an aggrieved person challenges the directive in court.

The Ghanaian Lens is therefore calling on the authorities to, even this lat in the day, make a definitive pronouncement on this directive so as to set the records straight.

While such a definitive statement may not necessarily reverse whatever inconvenience the earlier directive issued by the Ga Traditional Council may have caused, it would certainly act as a check on similar such behaviours in the future.

We hope that the authorities are listening.