A meeting on September 1, 2008 between former President J. J. Rawlings and security experts who were in charge of the various security agencies during his tenure as President of Ghana was held. They are said to have discussed how best they can also contribute in solving the worsening security situation in the country.
The former security persons are; Lt. Gen. Arnold Quainoo, Former General Officer Commanding and first ECOMOG Commander, Brigadier General Nunoo Mensah, twice former Chief of Defence Staff, Rear Admiral Owusu Ansah, former Chief of Naval Staff, Mr C.K Dewornu, former Inspector General of Police, F.Y. Asare, former Greater Accra Regional Police Commander, Bruce Konuah, former Defence Advisor to Pakistan and W.K Aboah, former Commissioner of Police from entering military installations.
The former President was under ban from entering all military and security installations and the ex-security persons meeting him exposed themselves to similar fate. The government subsequently banned all of them from all military and security installations in Ghana.
As usual the mdeia and the general public have had their say but still government is having her way.
Ironically, the people under the spotlight have had dreadful security past. The Former president himself is noted for three coups in Ghana including overthrowing a president he handed over to (Dr. Hilla Liman).
For now just read some record of General Quainoo as Commander of ECOMOG and accounts of the assassination of Liberian President Samuel Kayon Doe.
ECOMOG is a West African peacekeeping force that began with approximately 3,000 troops the vast majority being Nigerians. ECOMOG is acronym for the Economic Community Cease-Fire Monitoring Group apparently coined by General Quainoo and Dr. Abass Bundu, then ECOWAS Executive Secretary. There has been much speculation about the ulterior motives of the participating states Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Guinea Conakry, Senegal, and the Gambia for intervening in Liberia. The group spent several years in Liberia, yet its goal of bringing peace to the country remained elusive until the UN virtually took over the mission.
On September 9, 1990 President Samuel Doe, on a visit to ECOMOG-headquarters at the Freeport in Monrovia, was captured by Prince Yormie Johnson. How this could happen is still unclear. He had gone there for a meeting with Lietenant General Quainoo and was captured from the meeting after 45 minutes right under the nose of Lt. General Quainoo. Doe was tortured, mutilated and finally brutally killed by Prince Yormie Johnson and his men of Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL), a splinter rebel group. All the gruesome details were videotaped. The tape later found its way all over West Africa, images of the videotape shocked civilized people all over the world.
Lt. General Quainoo and the Ghana Army were eventually humiliated and demoted when a Major General (Maj. Gen. Joshua Dogonyaro) from the Nigerian Army made it quite clear he would not be under Lt. General Quainoo's command. Mind you, within the military hierarchy, Major General is one rank below Lieutenant General and under no circumstance should disobey a superior. He finally desserted his three thousand troops he had promised to take to Liberia and bring back alive. General Quainoo allegedly entered Sierra Leone by road and later returned lonely to Ghana in disgrace, a situation he described as "embarrassing, disappointing, and even personal". He became 'Simpa Panyin" as even his request to meet with ECOWAS chairman, Sir Jawara was refused. Ghana never had any other field commander for the ECOMOG mission following the assassination of President Doe.
Can you imagine another September, 18 years down the lane, this same General Quainoo attends another meeting to contribute to solving security problem in Ghana? President Kufuor needs to be very careful about any meeting with this man after all it is said 'once bitten, twice clever. Any such meeting could be Doe style assassination plot in waiting. What kind of useful advice can he offer? We need to be serious in this country and call a spade a spade. We cannot have two parallel security running in Ghana. Ghana at all times will have just one commander in chief, no defacto CIC, period.
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