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The Member of Parliament for Ningo-Prampram constituency, Samuel Dzata George, says vigilante groups are just Community-based Organizations.

“The party; the NDC does not have any vigilante groups; these are groups that owe allegiance to individuals . . . I will refer to them as a community-based organization,” he said when he appeared before the Emile Short Commission, Monday.

His answer appears almost in sync with those of the NDC parliamentary candidate for the just ended Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election, Delali Kwesi Brempong, that the two main political parties - the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) -
do not own the vigilante groups attributed to them.

He believes the vigilante groups are owned by some mafias within the political parties whose aim is to cause commotion.

Delali Kwesi Brempong was responding to Chairman of the Commission, Justice Emile Short question of whether his party, the NDC had measures put in place to disband its vigilante groups.

Disband, Or....

There have several calls from well-meaning Ghanaians that the state takes a decisive position and disband all political vigilante groups to save the nation from future acts of violence.

Thus it was hailed as a step in the right direction which could nip the worrying and unacceptable phenomenon in the bud, when President Akufo- Addo, during the delivery of the State of the Nation Address last Thursday, warned the NPP and NDC, that if they do not voluntarily meet to fashion out ways to disband their vigilante groups, he would apply legislation to disband them himself.

Vigilantes Owe Allegiance To Individuals

Quizzed if he believed that these vigilante groups are units of the various political parties they are affiliated to, Sam George, who also narrated the sequence of events leading to him being slapped on that day, said “it will be naïve for me to suggest that political parties may not benefit from these groups” adding that “I believe that these vigilante groups owe allegiance to individuals; these individuals use them for political purposes served through a vehicle of political parties”.