The National Media Commission (NMC) has written to the National Security Ministry for updates on investigations into alleged brutalities against Citi FM journalist, Caleb Kudah.

Speaking in an interview with Emefa Apawu on the Midday News on Joy FM, the Executive Secretary of the NMC, George Sarpong stated that the Accra-based FM station has formally informed them about the incident. Therefore the NMC has forwarded the complaint to the National Security Ministry for their reaction. "This is simply in honour of the principle of natural justice. So we have given it to them to also tell us their version of the incident. “

“We received the letter from Citi FM yesterday and sent it to them (national security) the same day. I have not confirmed whether they received it within the same period but we sent it yesterday just before the close of day,” he told Emefa Apawu.

Responding to a question on whether NMC has timelines for this investigation he said, “we requested that National Security Ministry submits their response to us by next Monday. We hope to schedule the hearing by Wednesday. Depending on how long this takes, we are hoping that it shouldn’t take that long. Our expectation is that within the next two weeks we should be done with this.”

On Tuesday, May 11, a Citi FM journalist, Caleb Kudah was arrested and allegedly assaulted for filming abandoned state vehicles at a national security facility.

According to Mr Kudah, the operatives pushed and kicked him in the groin. He also claimed he was slapped repeatedly by the operatives till he felt dizzy.

Subsequently, The Ministry of National Security said it had initiated investigations into the alleged assault on Caleb Kudah and his colleague, Zoe Abu-Baidoo by security operatives during their arrest and interrogation.

In a statement signed by Chief Director of the Ministry, Lt. Col. Ababio Serebour (retd.), the Ministry said, “ we take with all seriousness, the allegations of manhandling of the two journalists during the interrogations.”

“The Ministry of National Security assures the public that appropriate actions shall be taken if the allegations are found to be true” the statement assured.

The alleged assault on the journalist led to the petitioning of NMC by the Management of Citi FM to probe the circumstances leading to the alleged assault.

Commenting on calls for an independent probe into the alleged assault, Mr Sarpong said, “the NMC Is an independent constitutional body so when I hear calls for an independent inquiry into the matter, my understanding is that they are calling on the independent NMC to do this. So that is exactly what NMC is doing.”

“We want first of all, primarily to understand the truth. What is the truth? And then when we're able to establish the truth, we take it up from there,” he added.