Kofi Ampeah Woode
Ghana’s Minister for Defence – Dr Edward Kofi Omane Boamah has called on his country’s civilian population, to give the military maximum cooperation as their civil responsibility, for the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) to succeed in its mandate of maintaining territorial integrity and internal security.
Dr EK Omane Boamah made the call when he met with the Press Corps of GAF – also known as the Defence Press Corps (DPC) – on Tuesday 11 February 2025, at the Ministry of Defence (MoD), Accra.
To attain that objective, Dr Omane Boamah asserted, there is the need to ensure that interactions between GAF and the general populace is civil, healthy and friendly.
He thus urged the Ghana Football Association to reconsider its suggestion to request for the presence of soldiers at various stadia, during Category A matches, and said it would over-expose the military to its civilians, abusing the relationship.
“We believe that the Ghana Police Service has enough men and women, well-trained, some of them with specialized training, to be able to maintain peace, law and order”, he stated emphatically.
For the military who have mainly been trained with ‘enemy’, ‘shoot’, ‘kill’, it is actually not the best to be sending such personnel at the least threat, at the least provocation to the people. When they are training, arrest is not really part of what they are supposed to be doing. If they are to arrest, they would even call IT capture”, he said.
After soliciting for views and concerns of the Press Corps, Minister Boamah outlined some objectives of his tenure:
The new Minister intends to cultivate a culture of completing uncompleted and ongoing projects, some of which were commenced as far back as 2010; which he humorously referred to himself as possessing credentials in completing uncompleted projects, as a former Minister at the Ministry of Communications.
He also intends to only commence new projects, with clear financial support in mind, innovate financing from GAF’s participation in various peace support operations; and tackling some global climate-response challenges through the military.
He affirmed that Public/Private Partnership (PPP) financing of projects would continue, however, it would be cultivated to a marriage of completing existing projects, whilst new ones are also done; a directive which he believes if pursued, would be able to complete the uncompleted projects, and regenerate dilapidated accommodation facilities at barracks.
He also intends converting incandescent bulbs into energy-saving ones, to reduce the amount of electrical power energy consumed as a Ministry, and also as the Armed Forces.
Dr Omane Boamah aims to tackle the age-old sewage system challenges at various barracks; adopt a variety of mechanisms to address the major challenge of accommodating personnel – which deficit he says ran into tens of thousands.
Some of the antidote mechanisms he suggested, were to let some personnel live among civilians as a deliberate policy – which he says is subject to a ‘philosophical discussion’ by Ghana’s Military High Command (MHC), after ascertaining the critical numbers that are needed at any point in time within the barracks.
“We will build on the successes of our predecessors so that the Ghana Armed Forces will be highly motivated, very well trained as we know them to be, and the expansion and modernization of the Ghana Armed Forces will continue”, the Minister stated.
Besides fighting Violent Extremism and terrorism as external threats, he said GAF will be made ready and willing to assist to address the phenomenon of the government’s fight against illegal mining and obscene pollution of the nation’s water bodies, as part of the internal security concerns.
In the interactions, besides making some welfare proposals of media personnel to the MoD, Yours Truly also suggested to the Minister to adopt a policy of siting new accommodation structures, not close to the barracks, but rather at its boundaries, to forestall the issue of encroachment of GAF lands.
Present at the meeting included the Deputy Minister-designate – Mr Brogya Gyamfi; Director General, Department of Public Relations, GAF – Brigadier General (Brig Gen) Eric Aggrey-Quashie; the Acting Judge-Advocate, MoD – Brig Gen Benjamin Amoah-Boakye; the Military Attaché to the Minister – Naval Captain Michael Addo Larbi; the Public Relations Officer, MoD – Colonel Ernestina Assan, amongst others.
By Kofi Ampeah-Woode
