Mr. Speaker, I only made reference to Prof. Mills to illustrate the point that when such statements are made and depending upon the person who is making it, some amount of credibility is given to it and it is important that we as parliamentarians, former Presidents and Vice-Presidents, sitting Presidents and sitting Vice-Presidents, have to be a little bit cautious and I say that with lots of respect not in any way to attack the former Vice-President.
Mr. Speaker, the important point that I want to stress is with this perception that all these things are going on and the police is unable to do anything. Mr. Speaker, that is not true. In actual fact, Mr. Speaker, the nature of investigations require that we do not say too much at the wrong time. If the impression is being given that the police is not making any headway, I want to assure the House that it is totally untrue.
On the contrary, the police has a very proud record of accomplishment in some of these issues and with respect to the present ones, Mr. Speaker, we are doing very well although I would have wished that I do not do that for the purpose of getting the records right. Mr. Speaker, please allow me to refer to some of the resent killings and what we have done so far.
Mr. Speaker, you would recall that there was a Nana Bretuo who was a chief in Nankonase in Adansi and who was attacked and killed in his palace by some criminals on 31st May 2006. Mr. Speaker, three suspects have been arrested and they have been remanded by the courts and the court processes are ongoing. As far as the police is concerned at this stage, we know those who killed him; we have arrested
them and the matter is in court.
Mr. Speaker, again, in December 2006, one Nana Badu Boakye Dankwa of Achiase near Kumasi was having his bath in a detached bathroom by his house shortly after he returned from Tema, when he was shot and killed in cold blood. Mr. Speaker, all the five suspects involved have been arrested; they have confessed, in fact to the killing and the court is taking care of them.
Again, Mr. Speaker, there had been this rather unfortunate but famous one involving Mr. Samuel Anim of the Kumasi branch of the Ghana Journalists Association. Mr. Speaker, he was killed in a robbery incident, and in that particular case, a taxi cab was snatched by the robbers at a place called Ashanti New Town in Kumasi. These robbers then travelled in this taxi to the outskirts of Kumasi, to a town called Aburasu. At Aburasu, they abandoned the vehicle and snatched another vehicle -- a white VW Jetta saloon car. They then travelled in this car to Pankrono where they robbed a drinking spot and customers of the bar.
Mr. Speaker, the robbery first resulted in the firing of one Stephen Amoah who struggled with the robbers. It was the second firing that resulted in the death of Samuel Anim. Mobile phones were stolen and five million cedis was also stolen, all belonging to the owner of the drinking spot.
Mr. Speaker, two suspects have been arrested and they have been identified by the people who were there. Again, the court is taking care of them. Significant efforts have been made by the police and there is significant achievement in respect of this particular killing. The matter is now in court.
Again, Mr. Speaker, recently, in June
2007, there was the case of the Deputy Managing Director of Ghana Commercial Bank, Mr. Rokko Frimpong who was also attacked in his residence by some gunmen and was shot dead. Again, two mobile phones were stolen from the house.
Mr. Speaker, I can confirm that the police have made very, very significant in-roads into the investigations. We have arrested key people and they are also being taken care by the courts. We believe or the police strongly believes these people were involved in the killing, so even in the case of Mr. Rokko Frimpong very significant efforts have been made, very significant achievements have also been made.
Again, Mr. Speaker, recently there was a case of Nii Quartey, a retired officer of the Public Works Department (PWD) who also met his untimely death. I can simply say, Mr. Speaker, at this stage that very, very important arrests have been made and they are also going through the court processes even as investigations continue.
So Mr. Speaker, if you look at all the recent killings, you can only congratulate the police for the good work that they have done -- [Hear! Hear!] It is totally wrong to try to castigate them, to ridicule them the way that some hon. Members of the House were trying to do.
Mr. Speaker, the police has got two important things to do; we have got to be able to discourage people from carrying out such crimes; we have got to be able to create the situation where the criminals do not do it in the first place. But even more importantly, the people have another duty to ensure that when criminals do undertake such an activity, the police develop the capacity to apprehend them. And in all these instances, we have been able to make very good efforts and we have been able to arrest very key people
Nii Jonathan Tackie-Kome: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order. Mr. Speaker, I beg to say that from what I have heard so far from the hon. Minister for the Interior and from the Statement made by the hon. Member for Tamale South and the contributions from other hon. Colleagues, I do not think that the Statement is meant to be against the Ministry of the Interior or the police.
This august House is the representative of the people of this country. Therefore, if such things are happening, it behoves us to come out and express sour misgivings about it. Therefore, I would like to say that all that my hon. Colleagues have said so far do not amount to the fact that the Ministry of the Interior or the police are not performing; they are just trying to encourage the police to go on and do more with what they are doing.
