Okatakyie Afrifa-Mensah, the Media personality, has told President John Dramani Mahama he cannot use security and state agencies to silence anyone in the country.
The media personality noted that the use of security agencies to intimidate people does not, in most cases, solve the issues at hand.
According to Okatakyie Afrifa-Mensah, arrest may only intimidate a few people for some time.
He noted that pockets of violence could continue to build in different places, potentially creating more serious problems.
Speaking on Okay FM on September 17, 2026, Okatakyie Afrifa-Mensah stated, “If President Mahama does not take care and pull the brakes, but thinks he can use the security and state agencies to oppress the people in the name of silencing them, these things happen most of the time and solve nothing. It will only intimidate a few people for some time.
“Pockets of violence will be building here and there, and one day, if he does not take care, what will happen will be worse than what is already happening. John Mahama cannot use these arrests to intimidate anyone in this country,” he said.
He further cautioned, “ You can speak your mind, but let me say, for instance, that the choice of words I will use will be very different. When I was younger, I did some of the things a young person may do, but as I am older now, I will do things how older people will do them.
“What I have learned about politics is that if you really do not understand politics, if you speak and get to a certain point, you exhaust your words, and that is where the insults come in. But if you learn and have a lot of conversations, because you have learnt a lot, you will have lots to say in lengthy political discussions, and you wouldn’t insult,” he added.
In related news, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, the Flagbearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has condemned the arrest and remand of nurse and mother of three, Salomey Bafor Awiti.
According to Dr Bawumia, it is worrying that the nurse was picked up in the middle of the night by national intelligence officers and subsequently remanded for two weeks.
The NPP flagbearer said he has consistently opposed the use of insults in political discourse and urged political actors and citizens to engage one another respectfully.
He also raised concerns about what he described as the selective application of laws, arguing that similar conduct by different individuals should attract equal treatment.
Dr Bawumia disclosed that when allowed to lead Ghana, intelligence agencies will not be reduced to chasing citizens for insulting the President or anyone.
In a social media post on Friday, September 18, Bawumia wrote, “The story of how a Techiman-based nurse and mother of 3 (including a 4-year-old), Salomey Bafoh Awiti, was picked up in the middle of the night by national intelligence officers and has been remanded for two weeks on suspicion that she is abetting the publication of false news is very worrying to read.
This is not the Ghana we want to build. I can assure Ghanaians that when given the opportunity, our intelligence agencies will not be reduced to chasing citizens for insulting the President or anyone else.
I have always disavowed a politics of insults and will remind all in the political space of the need to be decorous. The ideas we need to transform our nation won’t come from insults. But I also remind the NDC government that any infringement on the right to free speech pushes our democracy backwards. Free speech, as unpalatable as it may be sometimes, is the foundation of our democracy.
Even more worrying is the government’s continuous selective application of our laws. Some citizens can insult and walk freely, and others are jailed because the government doesn’t like the target of their insults.
Please release Salomey Bafoh Awiti and others who have been similarly charged and jailed.
God bless our homeland Ghana and help us to resist oppressors’ rule!”
Watch the video below:
@ghnow_ Okatakyie Afrifa says President John Mahama cannot use intimidation to threaten or silence anyone in the country. #GHnow #fyp ♬ original sound – GHnow
@ghnow_ I haven’t left the media – Okatakyie #GHnow #fyp ♬ original sound – GHnow
