“Whatever it is, be assured that your soldiers are professionals, they don’t brutalize.” These are the words of General Officer Commanding, Southern Command, Brigadier General Abraham Yeboah Nsiah as the military dismisses widely circulated videos depicting military brutalities following the partial lockdown.
“Soldiers that you have are well trained, they are professionals, they don’t brutalize,” Brigadier General Nsiah said in his live televised address to the nation as part of the regular update government gives to the public on its efforts at combating the deadly coronavirus pandemic.
As of April 1, 2020, a total of 195 persons have been confirmed to have been infected with Covid-19 with 5 deaths. Also 3 persons have fully recovered with 31 discharged to continue treatment at home to be monitored by health officials.
President Akufo-Addo imposed a two-week partial lockdown in certain areas including Greater Accra Metropolitan area and Greater Kumasi Metropolitan Area effective Monday to stem the spread of the infectious virus.
There have been reports of security personnel deployed to enforce compliance of the lockdown meting out some sort of punishments to citizens for flouting the president’s directive.
Some videos making rounds show uniformed soldiers brutalizing people.
But Brigadier General Nsiah claimed those videos are “false” and not true reflection of what is prevailing currently. He noted close to a thousand soldiers have been deployed for the exercise.
However, he admitted that only one case has come to military high command’s attention which has been verified to be true of a military man whose action doesn’t meeting the military “standard”.
Even that, he said, it “has nothing to do with slapping”. Nonetheless, he said, the soldier involved has been withdrawn to the barracks, and the military police has been tasked to look into the case.
“All the videos you are seeing, they are false,” the senior military officer said.
“But whatever it is be assured that your soldiers are professionals, they don’t brutalize. We don’t allow it, we are never going to allow it…
“So it is never true that our soldiers are brutalizing our Ghanaians, we will not do it. We those in command will never permit it,” he assured after detailing the kind of briefing the soldiers are given before being deployed.
He has therefore warned persons sending false videos, and uploading them on social media to “run us down” and also to “discourage the soldiers” to stop.
“Let us support the soldiers on the field, it is in our own interest to support them,” he advised.
He also noted that the infractions being reported was quite understandable because people are now getting to appreciate the directives. He was confident from April 2 there would be less movement in town both human and vehicular.
By Isaac Essel | 3news.com