Ghana owes me an honour - Boakye Djan

I deserve acknowledgment and honour, not blame.
The spokesman and head of government for the erstwhile Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), Osahene Boakye Djan has declared that Ghana must acknowledge and honour him for being the only Ghanaian in living memory who has carried out the constitutional stipulation of punishing anti-constitution coup makers.

Speaking to The Independent newspaper, Maj. Boakye Djan said: “This country owes me an honour for being the only one who had succeeded in acting on the law to hold to account constitutional lawbreakers…who committed high treason by breaking the primary law of Ghana.”

“I deserve acknowledgment and honour, not blame,” he declared.

In a rather interesting revelation, Boakye Djan stated that, June 4, 1979 was the culmination of nine years of planning by the Free Africa Movement, who were a group of African patriots, both soldiers and civilians, who were disgusted with the way the military kept jutting into politics on the continent.

He said all those who had overthrown constitutions in this country had to be punished to serve as a deterrent. He conceded that, there are those who were victims of the extra-legal activities of some soldiers during the 211 days of the AFRC, but pointed out that, to him, there are two brutalities that override all brutalities.

Maj. Boakye Djan said one is the overthrow of the mandate of the people to rule ourselves, and that is what occurred in both 1966 and 1972. He added that the other is pushing out two of the greatest men the country ever produced, Dr Kwame Nkrumah and Dr Busia, to go and die in exile.

And so June 4 conducted “an enforced restoration of the constitution” by punishing those who had the audacity to overthrow the legitimate mandate of the people, he said. He explained that they took their mandate from three legal positions in “our republic, a constitutional provision; an Act of Parliament and the Common Law position.”

He explained that, section 12 of the Criminal Code, Act 29 stipulates that anyone who takes part in an unlawful overthrow of a government commits high treason, and the 1969 constitution as well as the current Fourth Republic Constitution state clearly that it is an offence to do same.