The media has been asked to be circumspect in its reportage of issues of the Kojo Armah’s committee to avoid prejudicing its outcome. At a news conference in Accra yesterday to react to media reports of the committee, the Police Public Relations Officer, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Kwasi Ofori, said such reports do not help the public as far as the outcome of the committee’s final report is concerned. "We urge all members of the press not to engage in discussions, innuendos and outright insults in the absence of published and certified report of the committee." The Kojo Armah committee was appointed on February 1 to investigate the circumstances that led to the alleged substitution of cocaine with flour at the police exhibits room at the headquarters of the Criminal Investigations Department. DSP Ofori said that following the alleged substitution of the substance, some media reports have accused the police as if it had a hand in the swapping of the substances adding that it "behoves on the press to exercise restraint for the committee to come out with its report and upon which the police administration would also act." He stated that to ensure transparency in the cocaine case, it was the police that wrote officially to inform the Minister of Interior, Kwamena Bartels, of the case and also invited the Ghana Standards Board to investigate the matter. Contrary to the reports that there was tension at the police headquarters following the refusal of the Police Administration to transfer some officers alleged to have been implicated in the case, DSP Ofori said it was not true that the police have been asked to interdict any police officer as speculated. "The police administration wishes to state categorically that, the police have not been asked to interdict any officer, nor has it been asked to arrest any Osu-based businessman. It also denies that there is tension over the creation of the Police Research Department." DSP Ofori said that when the issue was detected, the police administration gave out its total support to the committee and even sent a circular to all commanders urging those who were invited by the committee to report to facilitate the committee’s works. Additionally, the police administration resourced the committee with the necessary materials to facilitate its work. DSP Ofori said Chief Superintendent Alphonse Adu-Amankwah, head of the Organised Crime Unit, at the time of the loss of the substance had just been transferred as part of normal transfers to the Research Department. "The Research Department was created in 2007 following representations by the Police Council to the police administration to undertake research work that would benefit the service and not in 2008 as speculated." Source: The Ghanaian Times