Minority Leader in Parliament Alexander Afenyo-Markin has accused the government of using political controversies and high-profile arrests to shift public attention away from concerns over drug trafficking and cocaine shipments linked to Ghana.
He said the government should instead concentrate on identifying those behind major narcotics consignments and addressing security weaknesses that may have allowed such shipments to pass through Ghana.
Mr Afenyo-Markin made the comments at the launch of the 30th Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) Media Awards.
According to him, efforts by the Minority in Parliament to secure a parliamentary inquiry into recent cocaine seizures have been unsuccessful.
He alleged that whenever the Minority raises questions about security failures and demands accountability, the government responds with what he described as deliberate distractions.
“Whenever the Minority focuses on consensus, citizens demand accountability on these massive security failures; this government deploys a deliberate red herring to swerve public discourse, rather than tackling possible villains and clearing our national reputation. State security agencies are then deployed against political opponents,” he said.
The Minority Leader further accused the government of turning high-profile arrests into political spectacles that dominate media coverage while diverting attention from major cocaine seizures involving consignments reportedly linked to Ghana.
“These orchestrated spectacles are not genuine law enforcement actions. They are calculated red herrings, engineered to saturate news cycles, generate partisan noise, and pull the Ghanaian press away from investigating tons of cocaine seized abroad and a damaging fifth-place ranking at the port of Antwerp,” he stated.
Mr Afenyo-Markin urged journalists to intensify investigations into the movement of narcotics through Ghana’s ports and borders, particularly in areas where parliamentary scrutiny has been limited.
He challenged the media not to rely solely on official statements but to independently investigate the circumstances surrounding the shipments and demand accountability from institutions responsible for Ghana’s security.
“Do not settle for the sanitised government press statement or succumb to political diversion. Refuse the red herring. Maintain absolute focus on the facts, follow the trail of these narcotic shipments, expose institutional complicity and demand accountability for the sovereign people of Ghana,” he said.
He added that Parliament’s inability to proceed with the proposed inquiry places greater responsibility on investigative journalists to probe the matter and bring relevant facts to the attention of the public.
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