GHS31k Delta-13 fine ‘shambolic, disgraceful’ - Portuphy

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) have condemned the Nana Akufo-Addo government, accusing them of encouraging lawlessness in the country.

“As a lawyer, President Akufo-Addo is an officer of the court and should be concerned when the court is physically attacked and a presiding judge threatened, but President Nana Addo does not seem to care,” National Chairman of the NDC, Kofi Portuphy, said in a press conference on Wednesday, April 12.

Thirteen members of pro-government vigilante group Delta Force, who escaped from custody after being remanded by a Kumasi Circuit Court, were fined 200 penalty units each (GHS2,400) for the specific crime of escaping lawful custody, and will sign a bond of good behaviour for a period of six months or in default serve three years in prison.

However, Mr Portuphy has blamed the development on the president, indicating: “His public posture has rather sent wrong signals to the judiciary and law enforcement.

“How else do we interpret the decision of the Kumasi Court to treat so lightly violent elements who have escaped lawful custody? That ruling was shambolic and theatrical and only compounds the national disgrace that Prof Martey (former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana) has described”.

Mr Portuphy said the ruling “will certainly have grave ramifications for law and order in this country” and they “now have every reason to believe that the Akufo-Addo government is complicit in the violence being unleashed by Delta Force, Invincible Forces, Kandahar, and the likes”.