#OccupyJulorbiHouse demo: Lawlessness cannot fight perceived lawlessness – Peace Council to protesters

A number of bodies and notable figures have spoken about the ongoing #OccupyJulorbiHouse protest at the Jubilee House.

Among the figures who waded into the conversation on the #OccupyJulorbiHouse protest is the National Peace Council.

The Council has advised the participants of the #OccupyJulorbiHouse demonstration to exercise caution as they go about their protests.

According to the Peace Council, lawlessness cannot resolve supposed lawlessness and hence, the #OccupyJulorbiHouse demonstrators should do things in the confines of the law.

This was communicated by the Executive Secretary of the National Peace Council, George Amoh during an interview with Citi News in Accra.

“My advice is that they cannot use lawlessness to address perceived lawlessness, so if you have not been permitted by the same arrangement that gave you the right, you would have to exercise restraint. So, if there is an injunction, or your plan to go on demonstration has been curtailed by the same institution then just don’t do it because if you do it then you are also being unlawful.

“If you don’t do it tomorrow, there will be another time, so let us all respect the law for the sake of our democracy. If we allow small issues to divide us then we are opening up for insurgents who are lurking around,” Mr Amoh said.

Background

On Day 1 (September 21) of the #OccupyJulorbiHouse protests by the Democracy Hub, a group of young activists, and police rounded up 49 protesters who were marching to demand action on the prevailing economic crisis and corruption.

The arrests, especially how they were conducted by the police, triggered harsh criticisms of impeding the constitutional right to protest and deploying highhandedness on the part of the police.

Police sent the detainees to the regional headquarters before splitting them up into about eight police stations dotted across the capital, even as colleague protesters and lawyers worked to secure bail for the detained persons.

In this process, other journalists and protesters who massed up, especially at the Accra Regional Police Command, encountered some amount of police violence, including shoving, forced detention, seizure of phones, and, in the case of others, physical assault.

In their first of two statements on the day, police said the arrests were justified because protesters were defying a court injunction served on them, which they (protesters) denied had been properly served.

The second statement addressed the purported arrest of a BBC journalist and his cameraman, which the police dismissed as untrue.

By the close of the day, almost all detained protesters, per GhanaWeb checks, had been released from detention on bail.

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