{"id":600279,"date":"2019-03-19T06:46:18","date_gmt":"2019-03-19T06:46:18","guid":{"rendered":"

File photo: The 'Hawks' provides security for the NDC in the Ashanti region.<\/p>

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As the New Patriotic Party and the National Democratic Congress prepare to enter dialogue to ending activities of vigilante groups loyal to them, the former Secretary to the Emile Short Commission wants both parties to acknowledge that these groups\u00a0are a danger to the country\u2019s democracy.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to Dr. Ernest Kofi Abotsi, there is no \u201cstrategic advantage\u201d for the two leading parties to set up vigilante groups\u00a0whether they are in power or opposition because, they have been counterproductive.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cHaving these groups\u2026you undermine your own claim to leadership because the Constitution clearly has said that nobody should set up a state entity,\u201d Dr. Abotsi told Evans Mensah on PM Express on Joy News TV, Monday.<\/span><\/p>\n

He further explained: \u201cSo if you are in power, this flies in the face of logic that you set up a vigilante group given all the sheer force of state that you have behind you and if you are not in power, you give excuse to the one in power to go after you for having set this up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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\"CODEO<\/p>\n

The decision<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

The former Dean of the GIMPA Law School, therefore, wants both the NPP and NDC to be decisive in dissociating themselves from these groups in order to bring sanity into the political space.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think moving forward, there is the need for a stepping back of the two leading [political] parties that we have in Ghana, both of whom have apparently, at a certain level, either openly or tacitly admitted that they benefit from the use of these vigilante groups.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cI think there must be a certain reckoning or recognition that these groups are counter-productive, whether they are in power or out of power,\u201d he advised.<\/span><\/p>\n

Admissions and denials<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

Despite the denial by the two leading political parties, NPP and NDC, that they own these groups, some key activists have admitted that they benefited from their activities.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Former Deputy Ashanti Regional Minister and leading member of the opposition NDC, Joseph Yamin, has openly admitted to financing activities of \u2018Hawks\u2019 group who offer protection to party members in the Ashanti Region.<\/span><\/p>\n

General Secretary of the governing NPP, John Buadu, who testified at the Commission\u2019s hearings into the violence that characterised the January 31 by-election at Ayawaso West Wuogon constituency, also said he is a beneficiary of a vigilante group.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to Mr. Buadu, that became necessary after the state security failed to come to his rescue when his life was in danger during a political event.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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As part of efforts to disband these groups, President Nana Akufo-Addo set up the three-member Commission of Inquiry into the by-election violence that marred the election. <\/span><\/p>\n

The Commission was headed by former Head of the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Justice Francie Emile Short while Prof. Henrietta Mensa Bonsu and former IGP P.K Acheampong were members.<\/span><\/p>\n