Adopt non-partisan posture on Election Day – Liberia IGP tells Ghana Police

The Inspector General of the once war-torn Liberia, Gregory Olivier Wendel Colman, has asked police personnel deployed for Ghana’s general elections Wednesday to adopt a non-partisan posture by being neutral.

“To the Police, be the police; non partisan, be as neutral as transparent as you can, be accessible to all and deliver those services that the Ghanaian people so deserve from a police service,” he advised Tuesday.

Mr Colman gave the advise when he appeared on Media General’s Election Command Centre platforms to share the experiences of his country’s elections and also to learn from that of Ghana on December 7.

Liberia was in the Guinness Book of Record [1982], listed as the country with the “fraudulent” elections in world history following the country’s 1927 presidential elections, which gave President Charles King landslide victory.

The country until 2003, suffered a brutal 14-year conflict, which started in 1989 and saw up to 250,000 people killed while thousands more were left mutilated and raped. As the country goes to the polls once more next year, Mr Colman and a Police delegation have arrived in Ghana observer the country’s general elections on Wednesday and draw some lessons from how the Ghana Police will conduct itself.

According to the IGP, the Liberian Police and the security sector in general was partly blamed for the civil war that ravaged the country. “Liberia yesterday was like the light in the sub region [but] as a result of the violence, we’re years behind.

Now we look to Ghana. We are also here to share with you that it cost us dearly. We can’t even begin to factor how much it destroyed us,” he said. “It destroyed the family; it broke the family apart. It tore off the society and there’s just that ripple effect because once the family is no longer cohesive and it’s been torn apart the structure, the social fabric does no longer exist,” he indicated.

The IGP thus advised Ghanaians to do all that it takes to consolidate the democratic dispensation in the country and urged the Police to play their role

“I have no doubt in the current administration that they are able to produce that. I believe over the years, their track record has spoken for itself and this process will be added to history that once again they’ve performed beyond expectation,” he observed. He added: “My thinking is that the Ghana Police is one of the best in this sub region; their overall performance, their contribution to respect for democracy in other countries, specifically in my own country Liberia.

Ghana’s role in Liberia Mr Colman noted Ghana’s role in keeping peace in Liberia during the civil war was commendable, and has over the years strengthened the ties between the two countries and their people. “Ghana has played a role that we can never ever forget.

We’re tied to each other; we’re one family, we’re one people. We appreciate everything that you all Ghanaians.