Can Police be trusted to be fair to all?
The Ghana Police Service (GPS) has in a swift action arrested a trotro driver and his mate for assaulting a policeman, Constable Julius Mawuli Ekpe on the Mallam-Kasoa Highway in Accra.
The arrest is coming barely four days after a video in which the driver and his mate subjected the policeman to severe beatings went viral.
In the six seconds video recorded by a bystander, the driver and the mate were seen punching the policeman in the face at rapid pace although the “peace officer” was in helmet.
The police in dispatch arraigned the subjects before court and they have been remanded in police custody for two weeks to re-appear again.
The police action is very commendable and consistent with how they handle cases involving their own.
The Ghanaian Times has on record numerous cases about police that have been dealt with decisively but that cannot be said when the case is against police personnel.
There are many examples we can cite but for the purposes of this editorial, we are going to name two such cases against police.
On March 27 last year, Latif Idris, who works with the Multimedia Group, was brutally beaten to near death at the headquarters of the Ghana Police Service.
His crime was for doing his job as a journalist by asking police officers a question at a time the officers had been deployed to maintain law and order by dispersing a supposedly rowdy crowd.
It is appalling to know that almost a year after Latif was nearly assaulted to death, all the police has done is to issue statement indicating the commencement of a supposed investigation.
Two Ghanaian Times Reporters, Malik Sulemana and Raissa Sambou, who is a also a nursing mother, were assaulted by 10 police officers and a military man and had to be sent to separate hospitals for immediate medical attention on the same day Constable Ekpe was captured on video being beaten.
While perpetrators of the assault on the policeman have been processed for prosecution, no action, as of yet, has been taken against the team of police attackers on the journalists.
We have heard from some quarters of the GPS that the Ghanaian Times journalists are responsible for delay in prosecution of the assault case.
This is a lame excuse and we are at a loss as to what the excuse would have been if the worst had come out of the assault.
Without admitting that the Police are unfair, recent happenings buttresses the point that their modus operandi changes immediately one of their own is found at the wrong end of the law.
The Ghanaian Times calls on the Police to come clean and act fairly if we all desire a safe, secure and peaceful nation.
We wish to remind the police that the law is no ‘respecter’ of persons, groups, tribes and institutions and that requires that all citizens are treated equally and fairly.
We demand same swift and decisive response from the police when one of their own engages in such despicable and shameful act against a journalist or any member of the public.