“Drug suspect’s escape, an embarrassment to law enforcement

Page 23: Daily Graphic, January 13, 2009.
Story: Albert K. Salia
TWO security and narcotics experts have described the escape of a drug suspect from the 37 Military Hospital as an embarrassment to law enforcement.
They said it also demonstrated the culture of impunity in which drug traffickers were manipulating personnel of the enforcement agencies.
Dr Kwesi Aning, who is the Head of the Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution Department (CPMRD) of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, and Mr K. B. Quantson, a former National Security Co-ordinator, made the comments in response to a publication in the January 12, 2009 edition of the Daily Graphic about the escape of a drug suspect at the 37 Military Hospital on December 25, 2008.
Dr Aning said the escape showed that there was “a near culture of impunity in the manner in which those who deal with drugs feel secure that the agencies that are constitutionally mandated to ensure the fight against drugs can be manipulated to suit the interests of such drug lords and their gangs”.
He said the ability of a handcuffed drug suspect to escape from a military hospital raises disturbing questions that would need to be answered quickly if Ghana’s hard-earned reputation was not to be destroyed.
He, therefore, called for an overhaul of the Narcotics Control Board and a revision of PNDCL 236 to enable a reconstituted independent board to respond appropriately to “a national disgrace”.
Dr Aning said Ghana had a maximum of three to five years window within which to challenge the audacity with which those traffickers performed their nefarious activities in Ghana due to the sensitivity of the drug issue in Ghana and the persuasiveness of such activities.
He said a holistic approach to tackling the issue was for a bipartisan parliamentary commission of all parties supported by technical experts from Ghana and from Interpol and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the UN Special Office for Africa to come to grips with the crisis.
He reminded all stakeholders in Ghana’s democracy that drugs posed the greatest challenge to the country’s democracy and security.
For his part, Mr Quantson, who was also the first Executive Secretary of NACOB, said President Mills must see the drug menace as a national calamity that needed urgent attention.
He said the setting up of a bi-partisan parliamentary committee would also send the right signal to the world that Ghana was serious in responding to the crisis.
He expressed regret about the falling of Ghana’s position as a major player in the fight against drugs.
Mr Quantson said a failure to act on the problem immediately would have catastrophic consequences that posterity would not forgive the present generation for.