Govt Dismisses Illegal Arms Clearance Allegation

The Government has dismissed allegations that unauthorized persons recently cleared a some military hardware from the Kotoka International Airport .
The allegation was made by a social pressure group, the Socialist Forum. They said while government has the right to import arms, it wasn't convincing enough that the items were cleared by ex-military officials according to their reliable sources.

The allegation came on the back of accusations that the NPP government was training its own militia outside the forma military structure.

The Socialist Forum at a point last year, expressed its concern about the situation explaining that the current political contest and tension between the NPP and NDC could lead to an armed conflict if militia groups are allowed to operate outside the constitution.
But Information Minister, Nana Akomea, told JOYNEWS that the imported military hardware was actually cleared by persons authorized to do so.
"Some ammunition was brought in legally through the legal channels and was ordered, cleared and supervised by security persons in the pursuit of their legitimate national security duty.
"It has not fallen into the hands of unauthorised persons and was not cleared by unauthorised persons as has been claimed."
On reports in the Insight newspaper that he and Interior Minister disagree on the arms subject, Akomeah said the newspaper was only being mischievous.

Below is Nana Akomeah's full statment released to the press.

Recent newspaper reports and public/media discussions have alleged that weapons and ammunitions have been importe into the country to further some sinester political objective.
This allusion of some sinester political objective is totally unfounded.
The program of hosting ECOWAS Conferences, visiting heads of states and training of body guards for the new Liberian administration imposed increased responsibility on security guards responsibility on security agencies to train body guards and VIP protection units.
The extra responsibility goes with the need for extra supplies of ammunition.
Consequently 133 packets of ammunition were imported for training programmes. They were delivered on 12 November 2003.
CEPS procedures allows items meant for the office of the President to be cleared without inspection.
Nevertheless, for the sake of transparency, officials of the President permitteed the items to be subjected to normal customs inspection, and were thus cleared by the Ghana Supply Commission. All the invoices therefore became available for public scrutiny.
The officials who cleared the items are retirred officers of the Ghana Armed Forces who have been properly employed by the office of the President and are regulalrly engaged as training officers.
The trainees have traditionally been drawn from the regular army and the police.
All packets of ammunition were finally delivered at the Military Grounds where the training was taking place even though for security reasons, they were first conveyed to a temporary location. Armed security personnel were invoved in the process of conveying them to their final destination.
We wish to assure the public that there is absolutely intention of setting up a private security body, and to urge citezens to continue to place their confidence in the vigilance of the security services and their respet for human rights.