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President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo says the deployment of Military to the Volta Region is to prevent terrorist attacks in the country.

Ex-Prez Mahama Condemns Prez Akufo-Addo

Former President John Dramani Mahama issued a statement to condemn the security presence in the Volta Region, stressing that sending troops to the Region is a declaration of war on the residents.

He scolded President Nana Akufo-Addo for sanctioning the Military presence in the Region.

"I have sufficient reason to believe that there is merit in the concerns raised by the residents of these Regions. This represents another unprecedented low in the shameless abuse of state power to attack the very citizens whose safety and security the Akufo-Addo government should be protecting. It is becoming evident by the day, that the Akufo-Addo government perceives political power as an end in itself hence the resort to such crude and high-handed measures to usurp the mandate of the people.

"To send troops into regions in times of peace for the sole purpose of preventing them from registration amounts to declaring war on them. Any President sanctioning this sort of activity stands in breach of his oath to the people of Ghana. Any President doing this, commits a grave sin against the very people he swore to protect. No one would have imagined that a Ghanaian government would be so obsessed with hanging on to power as to subject its own citizens to such mistreatment and execute an ethno-tribal agenda of this magnitude against them," a statement released by his office read.

NDC's 1-day Ultimatum to Gov't

The NDC Minority in Parliament has also issued a day ultimatum to the government to withdraw military personnel from Ketu South in the Volta Region.

Chairman of the Volta Regional Caucus, Emmanuel Bedzrah in a press conference at Aflao, made a strident call for the troops to be immediately recalled to their barracks.

Member of Parliament for North Tongu constituency and Minority Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa further cautioned the government to withdraw the heavy military presence in the Volta region.

To him, the security presence is to intimidate the residents in the Region.

Army to defend Ghana's territorial integrity

But according to President Akufo-Addo, there is no ill motive behind the security deployment.

Delivering a nation address on the new voters' registration exercise Monday evening, he emphasized that the security personnel are in the Volta Region to defend Ghana's borders to ensure no acts of terrorism in the country.

''The longstanding deployment of security personnel, especially the military, along our borders is another dimension of this process of guaranteeing the peace of the nation. Fellow Ghanaians, it is no secret that our neighbour to the north, Burkina Faso, has, in recent times, been at the receiving end of a number of terrorist attacks, as has another neighbour, Cote d’ivoire. To shore up our borders against such attacks, and to defend our nation’s territorial integrity, the Armed Forces, at least since I came into office, have been very proactive in engaging in operations to secure our borders, and foil any potential terror attacks on our soil''.

''Operations such as ‘Conquered Fist’ and ‘Koudangou’ have been going along for some time, since 21st February 2019, to meet this objective. Deployments of soldiers in areas along our borders have been regular, and residents living in border towns will bear testimony to this," he added.