LET THERE BE ORDER

Page 7: Daily Graphic, March 31, 2012. SINCE the commencement of the biometric voters registration exercise, there have been reported incidents of disturbance at some registration centres across the country. So far, what has become evident is the fact that most of the long queues and their attendant confusion are the result of people moving from other areas where the exercise is yet to be conducted to register. We believe this has come about because either the public education campaign by the Electoral Commission (EC) and the National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE) has not gone far enough or Ghanaians are just anxious to have their names on the electoral roll, hence the rush to register. The Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mr Paul Tawiah Quaye, on Thursday toured some of the centres and issued a stern warning to troublemakers who would want to disrupt the ongoing registration exercise. We find the IGP’s warning to troublemakers very encouraging and should serve to embolden policemen that their head is solidly behind them, for which reason they must act to deal with all acts of lawlessness and disruptions associated with the exercise. The police have already demonstrated this by putting some culprits before the law courts for disrupting the exercise in the Dome-Taifa area in Accra. Another instance of the demonstration of professionalism and fairness by the police was revealed by the registration officer at the Techfam SCC registration centre at New Weija, Richard Mintah Boateng, that it took the timely intervention of the police to restore order when some supporters of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) allegedly stormed the centre last Sunday to cause confusion, compelling registration officials to temporarily suspend the exercise. Many a time, incumbent governments are accused of turning a blind eye on offences perpetrated by their party supporters while pursuing opponents of the government with alacrity. If that was the situation in the past, we believe these actions by the police in the ongoing exercise demonstrate that they have come of age. We tend to criticise the police too often without going into the merits and demerits of cases. Often, some of the supposed complainants refuse to even report the cases to the police and prefer to call into radio stations to accuse the police. Maintaining law and order is a shared responsibility and we believe we all have a duty to ensure the success of the biometric registration exercise. If others have lodged complaints and the cases are in court, then it is easy to monitor. We cannot refuse to report cases to the police and still expect them to prosecute non-existent cases. The Daily Graphic admonishes Ghanaians to avoid making wild allegations and rather report any incident to the police and be ready to substantiate it. We must acknowledge that the Ghana Police Service is handicapped in respect of human resource to be able to post personnel at all the registration centres. Also, it will be extremely difficult for a policeman or two of them to contain a marauding crowd, even when they are armed. Now that it appears most of the technical challenges associated with the registration have been resolved, we urge all political activists and Ghanaians in particular to remain calm and allow the exercise to go on smoothly. The IGP has given an assurance that the police will be resolute in dealing with miscreants. We need to co-operate with the police to ensure that all those who breach the rules are dealt with. The Daily Graphic will be monitoring events to see whether the police will back-track or be firm. But we believe they will be fair, firm and resolute.