Election 2024: We will come in only when invited by Police – Ghana Armed Forces
The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) has affirmed that its interventions and deployments in the 2024 presidential and parliamentary elections will depend on the request of the Ghana Police Service, which is the primary institution managing security matters in the elections.
Speaking at a stakeholder engagement with the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG) hosted by the Election Security Taskforce on Wednesday, November 24, 2024, Brigadier General Kweku Dankwa Hagan, head of operations, training, and peacekeeping at the Armed Forces headquarters, reaffirmed the neutrality of the GAF going into the elections.
“We are mindful of the fact that some sections of the population are apprehensive about military personnel taking part in the election. I want to clarify that the election is primarily being handled by the Ghana Police Service and other security services under the Ministry of Interior. They are the people you will be seeing at over 40,000 polling stations. You will not see military personnel like me at a polling station. So please be rest assured that we shall not be there. However, we have identified with the police service and the Electoral Commission more than 1,000 flashpoints and possible hostile areas, and we are going to have personnel there. We will not intervene in anything until the police service requests or asks us to assist,” he stated.
Ahead of the general elections, there had been concerns over the possible role of the military, with some critics speaking against the deployment of soldiers to the various polling stations.
