Prof Kwesi Aning of KAIPTC
• Police endangered the life of a citizen who reportedly had CCTV footage of a deadly robbery
• Prof Kwesi Aning of KAIPTC says police outing the man presented a danger to him and his family
• Aning has also decried the lingering weak intelligence structure in the Ghana Police Service
Prof Kwesi Aning of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Center, KAIPTC, has criticized the Ghana Police Service for endangering the life of man whose cameras purportedly recorded the bullion van robbery that took place in Jamestown months back.
According to the academic and security analyst, the manner in which the police handled the issue of the man’s refusal to cooperate with them over the release of the footage endangered not only the man’s life but that of his family.
GhanaWeb monitored comments Aning made whiles speaking on Metro TV’s Good Evening Ghana program (the July 22 edition) which was centered on the tasks that lay ahead for new Inspector General of Police, COP George Akuffo Dampare.
The issue of a Closed-Circuit Television footage from the Jamestown bullion van robbery that killed a police escort and another woman came up when police said the owner was refusing to hand over the footage for investigations.
Prof Aning submitted that that episode was only one of two recent incidents that indict the manner police worked on intelligence, the other issue he expanded on was the handling of the Ejura riots.
“The first issue is murder of the police officer who was in the bullion van and the police administration coming out in public to tell the world that somebody had his own private CCTV cameras but he is refusing to handover the film to the police.
“What are the rules around having CCTV cameras and what does he owe the police? Now, by outing this individual for having possibly filmed the crime, the police had actually put this guy and his family and his business in danger.
“We cannot have that kind of poor police intelligence and analysis,” he stressed.
About the CCTV footage
In June 2021, Interior Minister Mr Ambrose Dery had cause to appeal to a man whose CCTV cameras reportedly captured the robbery attacks on the bullion van to release the video to the Police to assist in arresting the criminals.
Mr Dery told TV3’s Dzifa Bampoh in an exclusive interview that the Police had informed him about the unwillingness of the man to release the CCTV video to help arrest the robbers.
“I want to emphasize that I told the Police each death is equally important. It mustn’t be a police, it mustn’t be a prominent politician, each death is equally important.
“This matter should be dealt with quickly as possible. It happened in the daytime but they raise an issue that I think I want to use this forum to appeal to. They say there is person who owns a CCTV in the vicinity.
“The Police are asking that they be given the recording of the CCTV but there was resistance from the owner. I want to use this medium to appeal to him to cooperate and to appeal to all those persons who were in the vicinity to assist the Police on whatever description or whatever information that they have to enable us track them.”