Do not use the reconciliation exercise to settle scores

Kumasi (Ashanti Region) -Persons appearing before the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) to testify have been advised against using the Commission as a platform for settling personal scores.

The Reverend Togbe S.K. Fugah, President of the Voltarian Co-ordinating Council (VCC), further counselled such persons to also cease perceiving the NRC as a forum from where they could insist on being offered compensation packages for the atrocities they suffered in the past.

Togbe Fugah gave the advice in a briefing with the Ghana News Agency in Kumasi on Sunday on the significance of the reconciliation exercise and the impact it is likely to make on the Ghanaian society.

He observed that compensation was not the key to relieving them of the pain and suffering visited on them and for that matter, it should not be their prime objective for appearing before the Commission.

Togbe Fugah stressed that instead of demands for compensation packages, the victims should rather strive at forgiving and forgetting the pain inflicted on them while, "leaving the issue of compensation to God".

He called on religious leaders and traditional authorities to also be at the forefront of the crusade at reconciling Ghanaians by revitalising and setting up sub-structures to engage in arbitration in their areas of jurisdiction.

Togbe Fugah noted that Ghana has been accorded recognition and respect by the international community because of ?the Ghanaian's spirit of tolerance and the peace currently prevailing in the country?.

He said Ghanaians owe it a social duty to further strengthen the peace by deepening the attributes of tolerance for each other, respecting the values of the various ethnic groupings and also approaching issues from a nationalistic point of view rather than from the political and ethnic angle.