The Daily Graphic reports on its front page, “No prosecution since 2006”, adding that no single security person has been prosecuted for attacks on more than 25 journalists and media employees since the year 2006.
It added that although perpetrators of such attacks on journalists are sometimes identified, the cases are settled sometimes with apologies while no compensation has been paid to such victims, who sometimes sustain life-threatening injuries.
Checks by the paper, revealed a tall list of journalists made up of reporters, photo journalists and editors, who have been assaulted by military or policemen in the line of duty and outside of duty.
One journalist with the Daily Graphic, Mr. Victor Kwawukume, is reported to have lost his sense of smell following beating he suffered at the hands of the Police in Ho, then Volta Regional capital, while on assignment to cover a police swoop on suspected criminals.
The paper also cited another instance, where one journalist, Mr. Latif Iddrisu of Multimedia Group in Ghana, was left with a fractured skull following a police assault at the Criminal Investigative Department (CID) Headquarters of the Police in Accra while covering a protest by the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) against the detention of their then deputy General Secretary, Mr. Koku Anyidoho.
The paper then cited various instances where offences against security agents have been expedited and concluded within no time, one of which just occurred on Sunday, where the suspects, who engaged a police officer in a fisticuff, were apprehended and arraigned in court on Monday.