BNI not lawless — Director
The Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) has expressed worry at the way the media continue to portray the bureau as a lawless institution.
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Officials have also debunked suggestions that the bureau was being remotely controlled by the government to intimidate the government’s perceived opponents.
“It is demoralising to hear the bureau becoming a subject of attack in the media, with some calling for the organisation to be scrapped,” the Director of the BNI, Mr Pius Marcus Awelinga, said.
“Scrap the BNI today and it will take only one month for the country to plunge into chaos, since national security will be compromised,” he added.
Describing criticisms that continual conflicts in parts of the country was an indictment on the bureau were unfortunate, he said: “There would be more conflicts in the country if there was no BNI. We operate better when nobody is observing,” he pointed out.
Mr Awelinga made the observations when journalists from the ECOWAS Community Development Programme (CDP) called on him in Accra on Friday.
The CDP Media Network, under the ECOWAS Vision 2020 project, is aimed at educating citizens across the region on sub-regional integration policies and programmes aimed at ensuring the overall development of communities in the sub-region.
“The bureau can never be controlled by any government in power. The suggestion that government officials speak for the bureau, thereby enforcing public perception that the institution is government controlled, ought to be discarded.
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“Why do you think Ghana has become a safe haven for all manner of people, as against other countries across the sub-region? It is because the BNI is doing something right to ensure that the country’s security is not at risk,” he stressed.
While condemning the over politicisation of activities of the bureau as being aligned to the government in power, Mr Awelinga said, “The bureau only updates the government on internal security, since the government is in charge of the economy and needs to be abreast of happenings.”
War drums
He wondered why the media, which are supposed to hold society in check, were rather urging politicians to beat the war drums.
“You must work dispassionately to uphold the truth and not allow politicians to lead the country to war. If people want to come to power, they must do so using the right processes and not for the media to provide a platform for the sounding of war drums,” he advised the media.
Leakage
Asked why cases being investigated often ended up in the media even before investigations were concluded, Mr Awelinga dismissed the assertion.
He indicated that when the bureau arrested the three South African ex-police officers who were training some activists of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), it never leaked any information to the public.
The bureau, Mr Awelinga said, only took an interest in the case and decided to investigate, drawing from the example of neighbouring Cote d’Ivoire where the combatants said to have thrown that country into civil war were identified not to be citizens of that country.
“If we brief government officials on happenings in the country and they go and make political capital out of such information by leaking it to the media, how does that amount to the bureau making such information public?” he asked.
On the public outcry that greeted the BNI’s decision to return the three ex-officers to custody after they had been granted bail, he maintained that it was standard practice for suspects to be sent back to custody, so that the sureties could follow up for the necessary paper work before they were released.
“Unfortunately, in the case of the South Africans, we came back to meet a letter from the Director of Immigration who asked that the three be handed over to the service for investigations into their immigration status,” he said.
JB murder suspect
Mr Awelinga also debunked media reports that the bureau had concealed vital information obtained from the suspect in the murder of the former Member of Parliament (MP) for Abuakwa North, Mr Joseph Boakye Danquah-Adu.
He indicated that the suspect, Daniel Asiedu, was at the bureau for custodial purposes.
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“We never interrogated him, since we are not in charge of the case. We only held him in custody for the Police Homicide Unit,” he said.
Publications in sections of the media on Friday, May 20, 2016 sought to suggest that the BNI extracted a confession from the suspect which implicated an unnamed Member of Parliament in the murder of the late legislator.
Mr Awelinga, who expressed displeasure at the publication, tasked the media to endeavour to cross-check their facts in order not to create unnecessary apprehension among members of the public.
Arbitrary arrests
He denounced the general view held by the public of the bureau as a lawless organisation that often undertook arbitrary arrest and detention of people.
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“We exist as an internal intelligence body working to protect the national security of the country,” he said.
Commenting on the recent arrest of the Managing Director of Marbles and Granites, Dr Edmund Ayo Ani; the alleged raid of the offices of policy think tank, the Danquah Institute, and the home of the security advisor to the NPP’s flag bearer, Capt. Edmund Koda (retd), Mr Awelinga denied that the bureau took part in those activities.
“Dr Ayo Ani was brought to our custody by the SWAT team that arrested him on the Spintex Road for allegedly taking pictures of vehicles in an adjourning compound believed to be the property of the Security Advisor to the President, Alhaji Baba Kamara,” he said.
In the case of the Danquah Institute, he said: “Our officers went there to invite the director and a security man on duty at the office but they ran into an adjourning office, placed a telephone call to people we didn’t know and gave false information. We, therefore, took a decision to withdrew our men, only to wake up the following day to see pictures on the front pages of various newspapers which suggested that the BNI had raided the office.”
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Writer’s email: della.russel@graphic.com.gh