Opinions of Monday, 21 May 2018

Columnist: JS YJ

The woes of our village dwellers

Security personnel charged to protect 'fragile' village dwellers at all timesSecurity personnel charged to protect 'fragile' village dwellers at all times

Growing up in a village and at a certain point in my life gaining the opportunity to study in the cities, I realized how our village dwellers come to be treated unfairly and unjustly. The question I do ask myself is "Are our village dwellers not citizens of Ghana?"

A typical case in point is even how our Policemen and women are distributed to patrol our cities but our villages are left unpatrolled and unattended.

And what I have realized again is that sometimes certain criminal offences such as murder, armed robbery, violence against women and children etc, are perpetrated in our villages and covered and gradually the case dies. I know it is the duty of every government to protect the citizens, but if the village dwellers are abandoned this way, how can we say that the state is being fair in her deals with the citizens?

At least any village where our citizens are living our security must reach them to protect them.

As a result of the absence of security in our villages, sometimes the only way for some of our village dwellers to to ensure justice is "mob justice" and this is also problematic and laden with several challenges because sometimes the innocents are mistakenly victimized in place of the actual criminals. This is a very big disgrace to Ghana after sixty one years of independence.

Looking back to my own hometown Debibi in the Tain Constituency of Brong Ahafo Regione, as large as it is without even a single Policeman/woman, and not that such zones are crime free; very serious crimes are perpetrated and covered. I want to therefore draw the attention of our government to heed and redeem the security issues of our village dwellers.

(A concerned citizen,Debibi- Tain Constituency, B/A).