Kan Dapaah advocates for punishment for electoral violence perpetuators

Albert Kan Dapaah, National Security Minister has stated that, until perpetrators engaged in electoral violence are punished, violence associated with elections are likely to recur.

Mr Dapaah told the Emile Short Commission probing the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election shooting incident on Thursday, 31 January 2019, that over the years, there have been political violence, however, the perpetrators of those crimes have not been punished.

This, he told the Commission, could be the underlying factor for the recurrence of violence in elections in the country.

He, therefore, urged the Commission to help in dealing with the situation.

“If crime is not punished it encourages others to do it,” Kan Dapaah told the Commission on Thursday, 14 February 2019.

He added: “We have this violence associated with by-elections over the years and no one has been punished. I hope this commission will find a solution to this evil.”

Meanwhile, former President John Mahama has said the Commission, is not the best to criminally sanction the perpetrators.

Mr Mahama told about 18 diplomats at a meeting in Peduase that the by-election violence was a criminal act that must be prosecuted straightforward.

“It is my belief,” Mr Mahama, who is running for the flag bearer slot of the NDC ahead of the 2020 polls, said: “That the President would have known what security arrangements were being made”.

“These are all issues that have come up. We believe that this is a straight criminal case and the people involved, many of them have been identified and the Police should have invited them, taken their statements and started their investigation. Instead, they have decided to set up a Commission of Inquiry.”

“We all know what happens when Commissions of Inquiries are set up. The main usefulness of a Commission of Inquiry is to bring out the facts and put in place measures to ensure that such a thing does not happen again but it is not the most convenient way for sanctioning criminal conduct.”

The Commission of Inquiry is chaired by Justice Emile Short. Its members include world-renowned legal luminary Prof Henrietta Mensa Bonsu and former IGP Patrick Acheampong with the former Dean of the Faculty of Law of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Dr Ernest Kofi Abotsi as its Secretary. The Commission has a month to present its report