FC blames Gt. Accra Police Command for encroachment

There was near confrontation between forest guards and police officers at the Achimota Forest on Monday, November 24 when guards, of the Forestry Commission, were prevented from erecting a wall by the officers, of the Greater Accra Region Command of the Ghana Police Service.

According to the guards, they were also in the forest to prevent a private developer from erecting a structure, an action that was resisted by the police officers, who were said to have been deployed by the regional commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Christian Tetteh Yohuno.

“The Forestry Commission has vowed not to allow this destruction of the Achimota Forest to continue,” Executive Secretary of the Commission Samuel Afari-Dartey told journalists on Monday.

“But to our utmost surprise, the Greater Accra Regional Police Commander, DCOP Yohuno, instead of assisting the Forestry Commission pursue its constitutional and legal mandate of protecting the forest reserve – which belongs to the state and the people of Ghana – has rather sent his men to prevent us from doing so while allowing the private developer to erect a wall.”

But in a sharp dismissal of the allegations, DCOP Yohuno told TV3’s Bright Nana Amfoh on News @10 that his Command has “no interests in state lands.”

“All that [the boss of the Forestry Commission] is saying is a fallacy,” he said.

He dared Mr Afari-Dartey to report him to his superiors if he finds wrongdoing in what he did, adding that he only asked the forest guards to get national security involved in the fencing of the forest reserve.