Policemen describe N/R REGSEC action as ‘whitewash’

Some policemen in the Northern Region have described the actions of the Regional Security Committee’s (REGSEC) action following the recent fracas between the military and the police where three policemen were beaten as ‘whitewashing’.

The men who spoke to this writer in confidence indicated that the REGSEC had simply addressed the situation on the surface without bringing the perpetrators of the police brutalities to book saying that the matter was purely a criminal offence and must be treated as such.

It will be recalled that on Friday 18th, some soldiers subjected three police personnel, two of whom were women with one being pregnant and a community protection personnel to severe beatings. Two of them were admitted at the Tamale Teaching Hospital while the rest were treated and discharged.

However, on Monday 21th, the Regional Security Committee stated that they had amicably resolved the issue and that the two institutions had resolved to patch their differences.

An investigation into the matter by this writer indicates that the police personnel were not satisfied with the outcome of the REGSEC but wanted the perpetrators brought to book to face the full rigours of the law to prevent future occurrences.

The policemen who spoke to me indicated that the military brutalities against police personnel had become common phenomena in the country citing an incidence in Yendi last year where a soldier slapped a policeman which resulted in him becoming blind in one eye, adding that at Kumasi and Gushegu, similar incidents had also occurred.

They also added that in Kumasi, the soldiers again vented their anger on some policemen and in Ashaiman, E.T Mensah’s bodyguard was killed by a soldier but in all these cases nothing serious seems to have happened to the offenders.

The aggrieved policemen sounded a warning that if nothing serious was done by way of proper investigation into the recent incidence for justice to be done, they will advise themselves.

Meanwhile when an eyewitness was contacted, one Safia Yakubu, a petty trader in Tamale , she described the actions of the military and the police as unfortunate saying; that the lives of the general public was at risk if the institutions that were to protect us were fighting among themselves.

She called on the appropriate authorities to take immediate measures to ensure the safety and protection of the lives of the public saying that armed robbers could have their way easily if such acts between the police and military continued.

When contacted, the higher authorities of the police, they refused to comment on the matter except to say they were working on it but one could sense bitterness in them. Unless sometime really is done to this particular matter for a permanent resolution, the country cannot be said to be safe.

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