Audio By Carbonatix
The Executive Director of the Bureau of Public Safety says the Interior Ministry’s continuous non-disclosure of reports into fire disasters is doing the country more harm than good.
Nana Yaw Akwada wondered what could be so secretitve about the reports to warrant treating them as classified information.
"There is nothing mysterious about investigations reports", he told Joy News’ Gifty Andoh Appiah on The Pulse programme.
The Executive Director said since 2010 the Bureau of Public Safety has been calling for investigation reports into accidents without any sucess.
There has been the June 3 2015 flood and fire disaster that killed more than 150 people and several market fires that rocked the country particulary in 2013.
There is also the inferno at the country's biggest pharmaceutical warehouse, the Central Medical Stores. In the past three years, there has been eight gas-related disasters.
“There is no national security issue in market fires. What is national security issue in a gas explosion on a private property?” Mr Akwada wanted to know.
Nana Akwada said he once again tested the system of accountability when the Bureau formally wrote to the Interior Ministry, over a week ago, demanding a copy of the report on October 7 gas explosion at Atomic Junction in Accra.
This was after the Ghana National Fire Service said they have finished its investigations and submitted the report to the Interior Ministry.
He, however, declined to share what caused the gas explosion.
But the Executive Director said he holds on to his expectation that the state will publish the report as they do not want to resort to the courts to compel the state to do so.
According to him, if by January they do not get any response, they will be suing.
The Executive Director of the Chamber of Petroleum Consumers of Ghana (COPEC) Duncan Amoah has also expressed disappointment in the position of the Ghana Fire Service not to reveal contents of the report.
“I am sorry to say what happened is a public incident, it wasn’t an incidence for the state, neither was it for the Interior Ministry. Innocent lives have been maimed with some lost.
He said he does not understand why the Interior Minister would want to sit on a public gas explosion report.
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