Civil society groups in the country have met the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, over what they described as bias on the part of the Chairman of the Special Parliamentary Committee probing the leaked audio recording on the alleged plot to remove the Inspector General of Police (IGP, Dr. George Akuffo Dampare, by some police officers and a politician.
The group, made up of IMANI Ghana, CDD, IDEG, ISODEC, and ISSER, met the Speaker in Accra last Friday to express their concerns over the seeming attempt by Mr. Samuel Atta Akyea, Chair of the committee, to shift focus from the terms of reference of the committee.
The President of IMANI Ghana, Franklin Cudjoe, has reiterated these concerns in an interview on an Accra-based radio station, CiTi FM. He believes that the conduct of the Chairman of the committee was affecting morale in the Police Service.
“We wanted to find out from the Speaker what the original terms of reference for the Committee were. Because we realised that the Committee Chairman seems to be setting his own questions and answering them. The Speaker was categorical that, well, look, I gave the Chairman or the Committee specific terms of reference. To get the authenticity of the tape, basically those comments that were made and the persons who made them,” Mr. Cudjoe said.
He further noted: “To the extent that those who have been largely accused have admitted their voices and all, well, we thought that the matter must end. So we were very alarmed that if we do not take care and the way the Committee Chairman was handling the issues. Be minded that I’m not mentioning the Committee, because the Committee Chairman is the one directing affairs. Even ranking members have had cause to even walk away at some point in time.
Meanwhile, lawyers of the Inspector General of Police have denied claims by Mr. Atta Akyea that they retracted their accusation of bias against him during the in-camera hearing.
“Based on his actions, we believe he is biased. We have said so. Many other people agree with us, and indeed, we think that it is sufficiently said and dealt with, and we don’t need to do what he expects us to do in the committee room.
“So look, it is a simple matter. We’ve never backtracked and this issue should never dominate the substantive issues. We have never backtracked and we know what we’ve said when we said is what we said, we still stand by it. His actions show somebody who is biased and we hope that he will shift from that position,” a member of the IGP’s legal team, Kofi Bentil, told Joy FM.
