THE WOOD COMMITTEE REPORT: WHAT NEXT?

Ladies and Gentlemen: We thank you for joining us today, at such short notice. We hope not to detain you too long.

Ladies and Gentlemen: we invited you here to resume the discussion about the urgent issue of our growing involvement in the international narcotics trade and the threats this poses to our nation.

The first threat is the growing rate of narcotics use and narcotics addiction – the direct destruction of thousands of potentially productive young lives and the ancillary damage to families and communities through violent robbery and sex crimes, insecurity especially for women, increased medical expenses (both for treating narcotics addiction and for related conditions such as HIV/AIDS).

The second threat is to the fabric of governance. The narcotics trade in creating a safe haven for itself corrupts and co-opts every arm of our government – executive, legislature and judiciary. It is penetrating our schools and our places of worship. There is no doubt that it is already playing a role in our politics and that it will move to dispossess Ghanaians of an effective franchise – if it has not already done so.

The third threat is the damage to our international reputation. The first fruits of this are already apparent in the manner in which Ghanaians abroad are apparently singled out for intrusive searching and the growing difficulty of access to visas even for official travel abroad.

Ladies and Gentlemen: we wish to evaluate the adequacy of our Government’s response to this threat so far. We believe that Government response has been entirely inadequate and non-substantive. We believe that it is our duty as citizens to refocus this Government effort and demand that our leaders deal with the big issues and deal with them resolutely.

The Wood Committee

Ladies and Gentlemen: the Wood Committee, appointed on 4 July 2006, has been the centrepiece of Government’s response to the narcotics crisis. The Executive established the Wood committee and presented it to the public as evidence of its resolve to deal firmly with the narcotics threat.

In truth however, Government ensured that the Committee could do no such thing. It refused to give the Committee the terms of reference, status, powers and immunities required to do this. For this reason, the report of the Wood Committee could not constitute a major step forward in our search for the truth.

The Wood committee was not the creation of the Minister for the Interior acting on his own. It was the product of a cabinet (i.e. Presidential) decision presumably taken with the benefit of considered legal advice from the Attorney General. In other words, President Kufuor deliberately opted not to appoint a Presidential Commission of Inquiry with an extensive remit and with the powers, immunities and status provided for in Article 278 of the Constitution. Government deliberately opted for an underpowered vehicle.

While refusing to establish an investigation with real teeth Government deliberately set out to create the impression of a “national effort” or worse to compromise potential critics by making officials from the two independent arms of Government and the media “accomplices” to this charade.

Justice Wood’s leadership of the committee, in our view, undermined the separation of powers and the constitutional independence of the judiciary. Why would the Chief Justice make such a senior judicial officer available for an internal ministerial inquiry? Why would he allow a Supreme Court Justice to operate in an environment where she exercised less power than a Circuit Court judge? Did he not recognise that without the appropriate Constitutional Instrument giving the Committee the status, powers and immunities provided by the Constitution, Justice Wood’s reputation and that of the Judiciary as a whole was endangered?

We hope that the Bar and the Bench will take to heart the concerns recently expressed by Justice Hayfron-Benjamin on these matters.

Hon. Abraham Osei-Aidoo’s participation was similarly potentially damaging to Parliament. In his case, the threat to Parliament’s integrity was compounded by a personal conflict of interest as it turns out that one of his clients was a witness before the committee. Fortunately, he had the good sense to resign before this became an independent scandal. Unfortunately, he was quickly replaced by another MP (a matter that the Committee report does not even mention). For our MPs, the recent disrespectful treatment accorded the Speaker, Mr. Sekyi-Hughes should be a reminder of the standards expected of them – internationally.

The inclusion of Mr. Ransford Tetteh President of the Ghana Journalists Association (putatively our “fourth estate”) was worrisome for the same reason – that it had the potential of compromising the media’s role as an independent watchdog of the public interest. It remains incomprehensible to us that a GJA president would accept to serve in such a position. We hope that the untenable position that he was put in (as Committee spokesperson berating journalists for their lack of restraint in covering Committee work) will serve as a lesson for all in future.

Ladies and Gentlemen: As has become the sad tradition in our national affairs, the Executive, Parliament, the Judiciary and even the GJA simply ignored these concerns. Neither Justice Wood, nor the lawyers who appeared before the Committee challenged its legitimacy and the process went ahead.

Findings

On 26 September, the Wood Committee submitted its report to the Minster of Interior. The Minister has since published the report on the Government of Ghana website – significantly, minus annexes.

As predicted, given the committee’s narrow terms of reference, the report does not shed significant light on Ghana’s narcotics crisis. We are none the wiser about the scale of narcotics trafficking through Ghana, the sources, routes and mechanisms. We have no greater clarity about the levels to which the narcotic industry has already penetrated the state machinery (especially our security forces). We do not have a proper assessment of the capacity of national institutions – preventive, investigative, curative, educational, etc. to respond to the cocaine menace. Most importantly, we do not have a strategy for addressing identified weaknesses. In short, we are exactly where we were in July when Government established the Wood Committee – in crisis.

In terms of the narrow investigation that the Wood Committee did conduct (“MV Benjamin” and “East Legon” cases), it is difficult to evaluate the Committee’s specific findings because Part Four of the Report “Annexes”, which presumably contains the record of proceedings is not available to the Public on the Government website. A few comments are however possible.

Ladies and Gentlemen: Despite the wealth of information in the public domain, the Committee found no systemic or institutional failures in the security system. This reflects more on the weakness of the Committee’s design, and perhaps its performance. The Committee found only a few bad eggs – Kofi Boakye and D/Sgt Samuel Yaw Amoah in the Police and (to a much lesser extent) Col. Akuoko and Ben Ndego of NACOB! There is no suggestion in the report that the Committee looked into the background of the officers accused of bribery / extortion and narcotics related offences.

As regards recommendations, the Report proposes the institution of what it calls a “National Task Force” to “... examine thoroughly the drug trade of which unfortunately GHANA has gained notoriety ..[and] work out EFFECTIVE MEASURES for curbing the phenomenon, which has the potential of destroying our hard worn [sic] DEMOCRACY”. Although the Committee chooses not to use the words this is clearly a recommendation for the institution of a Commission of Inquiry – an essential admission by the committee of its own inappropriateness.

The rest of the Committee’s recommendations are platitudes and broad proposals - such as improving the logistics position of NACOB, Air force, Navy, and the institution of special courts. These recommendations are not particularly insightful or useful given our complete ignorance about the ways in which these institutions have failed to protect us.

However, there are some issues that we believe fell within the Committee’s remit, but which it did not pursue. We mention three key issues:

? The Committee did not pursue the question as to when the President first learned about the “Kofi Boakye” recordings and what action he subsequently took. Minister Poku’s testimony that he doubted that the President actually received the recordings is not proof of this assertion. Given that we operate a presidential system, this is an immensely important question, far more important than the question of the IGP’s conduct.

? The Committee did not pursue (or even mention) the allegation (mentioned on the “Kofi Boakye” tapes and again in testimony before it) that the Asantehene attempted on at least three separate occasions to halt the police investigation into the MV Benjamin case. By any investigative standards, this question is germane because if true it would support an inference that the Asantehene had something to fear from an exhaustive investigation.

? The media reported that the Committee took evidence at Nsawam Medium Security Prison with a number of persons serving sentences for narcotics related offences. The report does not cover this. Indeed the report does not even mention the visit to the Prison in its section on methodology.

“White Paper”

Ladies and Gentlemen: on Friday 29 September the Ministers of Interior, “Information and National Orientation” and Justice met the media to endorse the Wood report. It was a strange and uncertain performance.

Here were three cabinet ministers lined up to present the results of an internal inquiry of one ministry to the media. It was as if Minister Dapaah required reinforcements in facing the media. The impression of hesitancy was reinforced by the content of the actual report. For example, Minister Dapaah tells us that he has received only “preliminary advice” from the Attorney General. However, he does not disclose what this advice was. What are we to make of this?

How can a government commence action without the benefit of considered legal advice? Does the AG disagree with his colleague ministers? Does he seek an escape route for himself in the likely event that the preponderance of professional opinion sways in the direction of Justice Hayfron-Benjamin’s own detailed criticism?

Another instance: during question time the AG in what has become a hallmark of his stewardship refused to respond to the technical or legal policy issues raised by Justice Hayfron-Benjamin. Instead he chose to make disgraceful remarks about the retired judge’s age, rather than to respond to his substantive arguments. A final example of Minister Dapaah’s disorientation and lack of confidence was his continued statement that he had referred various matters “to Government”.

Of course, Government claims it has adopted all of the Committee’s bland recommendations and indeed claims to have already initiated action on most of them. However, the minister offers the public very few details about how Government intends to go about this implementation.

Where do we go from here?

Once again, we are back where we started in July: a nation deeply traumatised by the cocaine menace and deeply suspicious of the public officials (including our political leaders) that must lead the campaign against this menace. How then do we move forward?

Ladies and Gentlemen: First, the CJA wishes to make it clear that we reject the Wood report as a Government cover up and call on the public to reject this cover up as well.

Second, we demand a presidential statement indicating clearly what information President Kufuor had about the narcotics menace prior to July 2006 and what action he took to protect the public.

Third, we demand a public presidential commitment to take on the narcotics menace head on, regardless of who might be behind it.

Fourth and finally, we renew our call for the institution of a Commission of Inquiry under Article 278 of the Constitution to examine the narcotics threat properly.

David Pessey
Committee for Joint Action
4 October 2006