Ghana’s Inspector-General of Police, Ernest Owusu-Poku, said Friday that his men’s firing teargas into crowded stands at the Accra Sports Stadium which led to 126 deaths “was totally out of place.”
Giving evidence before a presidential commission of inquiry, he said no teargas would ever be used at a stadium again following the 9 May tragedy where the football fans died after being trampled upon as they tried to run away from the policemen’s indiscriminate shooting.
Owusu-Poku said there are basic steps in crowd control like the use of plastic shields, batons and horses at the first instance.
When these failed, the next step should be water canons before resorting to teargas and rubber bullets, which should be the last options.
The police fired teargas, causing pandemonium at the same stadium during the finals of the CAF Champions League Cup in last December, leading to the ban of the stadium for a year.
Owusu-Poku said the use of teargas should be in an open space, adding that the architectural design of a stadium is not conducive for the use of teargas because it is an enclosed area.
He admitted that even though there are basic guidelines to crowd control, his policemen might not be aware of them since the revision of laws on crowd control would be implemented in June.
Owusu-Poku said a committee has been set up to review the laws on crowd control, which were enacted prior to independence in 1957.
The police chief said that prior to any assignment, it is mandatory for superior officers to brief their subordinates on the nature of the assignment and the actions to be taken.
Owusu-Poku said he has no direct role in what happened because there is a regional commander who also issues instructions.
He told the commission that the police on that day should have been briefed on the nature of the assignment and their equipment should have been plastic shields, batons, water canons and, where teargas was included, it was not to be used.
Source: GhanaWeb
