Member of Parliament for South Dayi, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor, has faulted the method employed by the National Security Ministry to remove former Ashanti Regional Security Liaison Officer, DCOP (Rtd) Ayensu Opare Addo from office.

According to Mr Dafeamekpor, the forceful removal of the senior officer cannot be described as appropriate and lawful.

His comments follow statements made before the Parliament by the National Security Minister, Kan Dapaah, who stated that DCOP Opare Addo was removed from office by men from the headquarters because he was obstructing the work of his successor, Col Francis Attah (Rtd).

"He was given a two-year contract to serve as Ashanti Regional Security Liaison Officer after the expiration of an initial two-year contract. His new appointment took effect from January 1, 2020, and was to expire on December 31, 2020.

"However, his appointment was terminated on February 19, 2021, by the National Security Coordinator. Upon the termination of his contract, DCOP Opare Addo was paid his entitlement as per his appointment letter," he said.

But speaking on Newsnite, the South Dayi MP disclosed that the answers provided to Parliament were insufficient.

"Myself and a host of other MPs were not satisfied with some of the answers. The Minister in charge of National Security sought to clarify the matter with his answers but there were still outstanding questions.

"For instance, if a senior officer of the National Security apparatus supposedly got his contract of employment terminated as far back as February 2021, and as of May 2021, the man was still there in office. What was then the security situation in the Ashanti Region that an officer, a senior one at that whose contract of employment had been terminated be accessing his officem," he said on Joy FM, Wednesday.

"Did the Minister of National Security report the conduct of DCOP (Rtd) Opare Addo to the police for intervention first of all? Did the National Security Minister also institute disciplinary actions against DCOP Opare Addo even though technically at the time he was resisting his vacation of office, he was not a staff of national security?" he quizzed.

But earlier in Parliament on June 23, the sector minister disclosed that negotiations to get DCOP Opare Addo to leave post without any incidents proved futile, thus, necessitating the National Security Coordinator’s decision to send men to Kumasi to change the locks to the office.

Despite these answers, Mr Dafeamekpor insisted that the controversy surrounding the removal was created by the National Security Ministry.

According to him, he does not understand why the Ministry would have to use three months to find a replacement for DCOP (rtd) Opare Addo, whose employment contract by then had expired.

He also questioned why DCOP Opare Addo was not retired in December 2020, as stated by Mr Kan Dapaah when he appeared before the House.

"We say this because in his former answer to Parliament, he clearly said that his original contract was to be terminated in December 2020. But for some reasons which he also refused to disclose to Parliament why his contract of employment was terminated in February.

"Now if you terminate somebody's contract in February, a security personnel, and then his replacement was to replace him on May 21, why leave three long months to replace someone you had relieved him of his duties. So the problem was actually created by National Security itself because they didn't find an immediate replacement for the man," he stated.

For him, the unacceptable conduct of the National Security operatives who were employed according to the sector minister to see to the removal of the senior officer cannot be encouraged in democratic governance.

"We all saw the video that circulated on this matter. We saw the man brutalized. He himself was on your channel and recounted the horrors that he went through on the hands of the acclaimed officers of the National Security operatives.

"We don't want some of these things to be happening in officialdom," he concluded.

DCOP Opare Addo has since claimed that he had been handcuffed and forcefully taken out of his office by heavily armed men alleged to be members of the pro-NPP vigilante group, Delta Force.

But Mr. Kan Dapaah disclosed he has not received any official complaint in this regard, adding that the DCOP rather was hostile to the team.

He accused DCOP Addo of pointing his side arm at the team that carried out the operation.

“Mr. Speaker, I would want to assure the house of our willingness to investigate the allegations should any official complaint be made by DCOP Opare Addo,” he assured Parliament.