: A THREAT TO DECEMBER ELECTIONS

FROM: William Nana Yaw Beeko, NETWORK ORGANIZER, bromzy2002@yahoo.com The Ghana Anti-Money Laundering Journalists Network finds recent cases of seizure of guns and pump action ammunitions as signs of emerging terrorist groups in many parts of the country.

For this year alone, there have been several reports of seized arms and weapons by the Ghana Police and it appears a lot more of those deals are still clandestine.

While commending the Police for their hardwork in ensuring total security, it would be prudent to point out that there is an arduous task so far as Ghana’s security is concerned, ahead of the December 7th Parliamentary and Presidential Elections.

It would be recalled that 5-men were arrested by the Ghana police with a soft-drinks distribution truckload of guns and ammunition bound for Nigeria.

The Greater Accra Police Command revealed that two of the arrested suspects were Nigerian nationals, while the other three were residents of Ghana. Please see full details of story on http://www.gistmania.com/talk/topic,88668.0.html?wap2 The Ashanti Region of Ghana also recorded its share of the terrorist threat where the Ashanti Regional Police Command found an assortment of weapons including pump action guns in the room of a man at Ogua, a small farming community near Effiduase.

A certain Nana Otuo Acheampong, believed to be the owner of the weapons, had concealed the 10 guns in a shelf at a corner in his room for reasons best known to himself.

The police, acting upon a tip-off, broke into the room on Thursday evening around 8:00pm in the absence of Nana Otuo Acheampong who had travelled out of the region.

Please see full details of story on http://www.modernghana.com/news/419239/1/police-seize-guns.html

A very recent case which makes it the worst of all, is the the news item that National Security officials in Ghana are currently investigating 32 people including six minors who were arrested at a training camp at Tongo-Dzemeni in the South Dayi District of the Volta Region. The suspected combatants were undergoing training with offensive weapons under the cover of darkness. The National Security Coordinator, Col. Larry Gbevlo-Lartey who confirmed this said the suspects; including some Ghanaians and other African nationals were being interrogated.

Please see full details of story on http://edition.myjoyonline.com/pages/news/201210/94870.php

In the year 2001, when the world witnessed the most infamous terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre in the USA by Osama Bin Laden and his Al-Qaeeda compatriots, little did we know that terrorism could spread to this part of our world in some few years to come.

Today, we have Boko Haram in Nigeria who have turned their destructive lights on the Northern part of Nigeria which has led to widespread violence and killed dozens of people in multiple bombings. The Ghana Anti-Money Laundering Journalists Network is not crusading for militancy but rather strong security operations to clamp down the operations of would-be Ghanaian terrorists as we draw closer to this year’s national elections. However, as we take reports that Ghana is on the list of countries that Al-Qaeeda terrorist group is targeting to launch fresh attacks seriously, we also need to take note that Al-Qaeeda will never come from the sky but will go through the backdoor to use Ghanaian youth walking on the land and not the non-exitent Ghanaians in the air.

To this end, it is important that we leave nothing to chance especially when it comes to security issues because this year is a very hot year for the people of Ghana in the wake of the national elections.

NOTE: THE GHANA ANTI-MONEY LAUNDERING JOURNALISTS NETWORK is a Chapter of the GIABA-ECOWAS NETWORK OF WEST AFRICAN JOURNALISTS AGAINST MONEY LAUNDERING It was formed on Thursday, May, 27th 2010 at the Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua Conference Centre in Abuja capital city of the Federal Republic of Nigeria during a GIABA world press conference and open house and interactive session with media executives from West Africa and other dignitaries from the sub-regional body. It included senior editors and journalists from Ghana, Nigeria, Gambia, Senegal, Togo, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Cape Verde among other West African countries to form a regional media alliance to wage massive crusade against money laundering and terrorism financing. It is meant to empower journalists and media practitioners to crusade against trans-national organized crimes The aim of the media network is to recognize the crucial role of the media in the fight against money laundering and financing of terrorism hence building the capacity of journalists to report well on issues pertaining to money laundering and terrorism financing.