Hold Your Triggers, Policemen And Women

Earlier this week, the media reported a bloody clash between the police and some drivers at Ashaiman, a sprawling suburb near Tema. According to some reports, the police arrested one driver and kept him in custody. His colleagues got wind and went to the police station to find out.

The situation degenerated to lawlessness when police fired tear gas and live ammunition at the stone throwing drivers. Two people, including an 11-year-old school boy who was completely unrelated to the issue dropped dead. The angry drivers also smashed the police cars.

This, once more is a clear case of the cat and mouse relationship between the police and the civilians they are supposed to be protecting.

In Kumasi on June 1 during the world cup match between the Blacks Stars and Libya, Samuel Ebo Bartels, Sports reporter of Citi FM, an Accra-based independent radio station, was violently attacked by a group of policemen deployed at the Baba Yara Stadium.

The journalist saidthe policemen, numbering about four,charged on him and beat him mercilessly.

Similarly, a photojournalistof the Ghana Football Association was alsoviolentlyattacked by the policemen after photographing the attack on the Citi Fm reporter.

Several factors account for the breakdown in trust between the police and the public. One and in fact the most dominant one is the wrong use of discretion by personnel of the Ghana Police Service. The use of brute force like what they did at Ashaiman and the assault on the journalists in Kumasi is something that could have been avoided had the policemen and women weighed various options.

Very often, the temptation to use the coercive force at their disposal is reminiscent of the colonial days when the Police were used to suppressing anti-colonial activists. Past and present police administrations and indeed past and present governments have failed to transform the Ghana Police Force to a service-oriented institution, especially in a democratic dispensation.

Little wonder that the submissions on Ghana to the United Nations Universal Periodic Review by both the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative and the Commission of Human Rights and Administrative Justice focused broadly on police brutalities in 2007. The two submissions said Police brutalities continue to undermine the security and protection of the Ghanaian populace.

The use of force in an arbitrary and excessive manner is not what this country hopes for as the 2008 general elections are fast approaching. The repercussions of police firing bullets and tear gas at supporters of political parties are anyone's guess in an election dubbed by the main protagonists as 'make or break.' While we all pray for peaceful elections, so Ghana can avoid election-related violence, the Police can do this country a lot of good if they can hold their triggers even in the face of provocation.

In the wake of clashes between the police and the public this newspaper suggests the formation of an independent police complaints commission charged with investigating police violations of human rights. The commission should have legislative powers to prosecute police misconduct as is done in the United Kingdom.