NCCE urged to intensify outreach education programme

Damongo (N/R), July 7, GNA - The Yagbonwura, Bawa Abudu Doshie II has called on the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) to intensify its outreach public education programme to enable the rural communities to make informed contributions on national issues. Bawa Doshie said the country's democratic experiment could succeed only when the people were so well informed as to be able to discern their civic rights and responsibilities. The Yagbonwura was contributing to a discussion forum on: "The role of traditional leaders in promoting democracy in Ghana". Chiefs, the police, Assembly Members, representatives of the NCCE and NGOs, attended the one-day forum, which was organized by the West Gonja District Office of the NCCE at Damongo.

Bawa Doshie said traditional rulers in the past combined the roles of the army, the police and the courts such as protecting their territorial boundaries against external aggression, maintaining peace and order, as well as settlement of disputes among their subjects. He noted, however, that the emergence of the supremacy of the state and the complex nature of society as at now, had modified the roles of the traditional authorities to the maintenance of peace, settlement of chieftaincy disputes and the administration of justice in minor civil offences.

Superintendent Peter Kobina, the District Police Commander in his contribution, said the role of the police was encompassing, including the enforcement of laws of the country. He said: "For this role, we are erroneously seen as enemies in the society, whereas in the absence of the police, there would be anarchy and a chaotic society". Superintendent Kobina advised chiefs and other traditional authorities to refer criminal cases that come to their courts to the police for proper jurisdiction in the law courts. Mr. Sam Bakari, a Field Officer of the NCCE, called for collaboration between chiefs and the police in the maintenance of peace and order in the society.