Former President and flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Mahama, has taken on the Government for its seeming lack of seriousness with respect to disturbances in the Volta Region allegedly being perpetrated by separatist groups.
Mr Mahama noted that the government’s seeming lack of seriousness is seen in how senior government officials have not visited the affected areas and the attitude of the security agencies as well as the President himself towards the matter.
“It looks like the whole government is not serious about this. The President is not serious about it. No senior person has gone to the area since this thing happened…The Minister of National Security, when this thing was very topical…He should have gone to the area to boost the morale of the security services there, instead he was in Kumasi with the President commissioning a compost plant,” John Mahama said in the Bono Region Thursday, 30th September, 2020.
He explained that the issue of secessionist protests in the Volta Region is so important that the government should have attended to it promptly and shown all the seriousness it deserves.
“There is nothing more serious than trying to break up parts of a country. And as I’m saying, they are not taking this seriously,” he pointed out.
But Government has been defending its handling of the situation, denying intelligence failure and stressing that that the security agencies have a foothold on the situation.
The former President disclosed that while he was in office as president, the Homeland Study Group Foundation had been in existence but were infiltrated for intelligence purposes. According to him, the Group at the time only engaged in workshops and meetings which were closely monitored.
Meanwhile President Nana Addo Dankwah Akufo-Addo has stated that he trusts the security and intelligence agencies to bring the matter under control, adding that as President, making hysterical statements on the matter will not inure to the benefit of Ghanaians.
Separatists groups in the Volta Region have been accused of launching attacks in the Volta Region as a way of asserting their right to secede from the rest of Ghana. The Western Togoland Restoration Front (WTRF) and the Homeland Study Group Foundation (HSGF) have been accused of being responsible for the recent attacks.
