Paul Adom-Otchere, the host of Metro TV’s Good Evening Ghana program, has accused George Akuffo Dampare, the IGP, of forming an elite unit within the Ghana Police Service.
According to his allegations, the aforementioned unit is a part of the Police Intelligence Department (PID) and answers directly to the IGP.
He declared that the unit needed to be disbanded right away due to the potential consequences of maintaining such a force in operation.
According to Adom-Otchere, who cited unnamed insiders in the service, “The PID is being used by Dr. Dampare to empower a certain elite police group and they do anything and nobody can talk to them and they talk only to the IGP.
Before voicing his concerns about Dampare having centralized police communications nationwide, he cited the case of a reported habeas corpus application against the police in the Northern Region over the reported killing of five young men in November 2022 as the work reportedly done by this “elite force.”
In the episode of his show airing on July 13, he made the accusation.
Adom-Otchere urged the authorities to look into the claim.
“When I hear that an IGP is creating an elite group in the police, I know that it is particularly wrong and the Ministry of Interior, the Office of the President should not countenance that. The police are the police, every police officer is a police officer, let’s not create any anything,” he stressed.
He mentioned the 64 Infantry Battalion of J.J. Rawlings’ era and the Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah’s Own Guard, led by General Bawa, as examples of Special Forces that have historically posed a threat to conventional armies.
“We shouldn’t have a PID that feels better than another police man. That is so dangerous and this is what we are hearing that is happening in the police,” he added.
Adom-Otchere claimed that the president supports Dampare and would not change him in response to the widely circulated tape that revealed plans to have Dampare removed.
“Nobody wants to change Dr. Dampare even Akufo-Addo will not. When his MPs said change Ken Ofori-Atta did he change him? We are still here. Ken Ofori-Atta has won a major success by delivering the IMF, nobody is going to change him,” he added.
