Mr. President, my name is Lance Corporal Daniel Kwofie with a service number 44679 but I am popularly known as Ahanta Apemenyimheneba Kwofie III in social media circles and other electronic media outlets. I was formerly stationed at Peki in the Volta Region but has recently been transferred to the National Police Headquarters, Accra. In fact, I am just one and half weeks old at the the National Police Headquarters here in Accra.
Certainly around this time last year, I wrote an open letter to your predecessor H.E John Dramani Mahama bemoaning the rate at which police officers die in line of duties with nothing done to their families particularly, the wives and children. It is a cause for worry and I need to be very sincere with you Mr. President. When I heard that you have made a cash donation to the family of Capt. Maxwell Adama Mahama, I was intrigued. I have been pondering on a lot of questions since then. Since I cannot get the opportunity to speak to you one on one, I decided to put my thoughts into writing, hence this letter of mine.
Mr. President, because I have openly been talking about these issues on a regular basis for a long time, I am no longer afraid of premeditated disciplinary actions in the police meant to seal my mouth anymore. I have never been afraid to lose my life as a police officer who has sworn an oath to protect lives and properties so I am not expected to be afraid of being pushed from the police because I am risking my career to speak on issues that is of interest to common the police officer. If I should go home for speaking the truth, I will just join the second hand clothes sellers here at Kantamanto because that was what I was doing untill I joined the police service. It is time we must take responsibilities to address welfare issues that is of paramount interest to the common security officer in which my case is the ordinary police officer. We are not given what we deserve and it is all because we cannot demonstrate or go on strikes due to the tag essential services.
I must commend you for your cash donation of Ghc 50 000.00 to the TrustFund established in memory of late Capt. Maxwell Adama Mahama. As a police officer who attended same school with him on the green hills of St. John’s School, Sekondi, I am very much elated to have seen your kind gesture towards a member of our fraternity -OLD SAINTS. In 2003 when I reported at St. John’s School, the late Captain was in final year so I should be happy to see my President donating to his family in hard times like this. As an old student of St. John’s School, I will join the Old Saints to pay our last respect to the late Captain when he is laid in state. I hear he will be given a state burial and that is very good to hear.
Mr. President, I however, have serious concerns about how security officers are treated particularly if one is a junior rank and dies in line of duties. This makes me to see your donation and establishment of the TrustFund in memory of the late Captain as very discriminatory and smacks of unfair treatments particularly to we the junior ranks who are always at the forefronts of risky duties which have tendencies to claim our lives anytime. Many security officers have died in line of duties but no TrustFunds have been established to take care of their wives and children particularly police officers. Why? I will not fault you because your government is relatively new but it is your donation that gingered me to write this long letter of mine. I would expect to see more of these donations and TrustFunds established in memory of junior ranks as well as giving them state burials too. After all, how many senior officers die in line of duties?
The very week that the Captain died, a police officer was killed in Kintampo also in line of duties but it is being treated silently either because he is a junior rank or probably from a very poor home. He is not from a generation of senior military or police officers, and not politically and socially connected like the late Captain so no one cares about him. It is sad! Isn’t it? He would silently be taken from the mortuary and be sent to his home town and be buried. If his home town is far like mine, just a handful police officers will follow his corpse to his home town to see where he will be laid to rest. Sometimes a police officer is buried without the usual ritual 21 gun salutes to inform members of the police fraternity who have taken the lead in the world of death that another officer is coming. Is it fair?