Kwesi Aning advocates for measures to control easy access to firearms

Prof Kwesi Aning, the security expert, is advocating for measures aimed at controlling easy access to firearms by individuals in the country.

According to him, there is poor tracking of people with unregistered guns, therefore, there should be a system that can check gun licences whether or not they have been renewed.

“There are loads of guns that are unregistered precisely because less than 10 – 15 per cent of guns that were registered initially come back for the annual registration. That leaves a big gap in the capacity," the Security Expert told the host of Joy FM's Newsfile Samson Lardy Ayenini on Saturday.

“There is a problem with the availability of small arms, how it is registered, who has them, levels of concentration and the types of crimes they are used for.”

Prof Aning indicated further that the Small Arms Commission has changed from being a regulatory body to playing an advisory role, something that has made their core mandate very difficult.

“The 850% increase in the availability of guns is relative to the existing number. There seems to be a certain romanticization around getting firearms and then using them. We are at a major risk," he said.

Prof Kwesi Aning’s remarks come on the back of the unfortunate murder of the Mfantseman Member of Parliament who was returning from a campaign trip in the Central Region.

Ekow Quansah Hayford’s murder engendered calls for the security agencies to investigate the murder and get those involved punished according to the criminal laws of Ghana.

The IGP, James Oppong-Boanuh, has, meanwhile, dispatched security officers to the Central Region to assist in investigations into the murder and has placed a bounty of GHC20,000 on the head of the killers.