Classified state documents risk being leaked

daniel russell

August 10, 2015 6:24 PM

Dr. Justice Yankson feared if nothing is urgently done to cure such impudence, very soon, government assigns will start leaking state classified documents.

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Deputy General Secretary of the Ghana Medical Association is flagging what he believes should be of a great source of worry to all as he accuses state officials of developing a penchant for leaking confidential documents.

He was reacting to the leakage of doctors’ demands tabled to government during a negotiation over their conditions of service. He strongly argued that there was no way the leakage would have come from the GMA.

He told Samson Lardy Anyenini on Joy FM/MultiTV news analysis show, Newsfile on Saturday a careful scrutiny of the leaked document shows that it was leaked from the government's side.

Dr. Yankson explained that what gave the government away was a “unique” mark in a form of correction effected on government’s copy which was not on theirs. According to him, that particular correction was made at the negotiation table so they did not get the opportunity to have a copy of the corrected version.

Even before the dust on the release of the doctors’ paper settled, government’s proposal to the striking doctors was also leaked. Doctors embarked on strike on July 30, 2015 over their conditions of service, and have threatened to resign en masse if nothing is done about their demands this month, August.

Dr. Justice Yankson has condemned the release of the confidential documents, saying they were done “in bad taste...there was no show of good faith to it at all”.

“As a country, I think we are travelling on dangerous waters. Because if you have people who are close to government or government representatives who have actually signed unto a document that this is going to be confidential, are able to leak out this same thing that they have signed unto, then it is possible that any state classified documents can easily be leaked out by anybody.”

He is therefore asking the government to take a “very good look” at how confidential documents are being leaked.

Charles Bawa Duah, a labour consultant, also concurred that whoever leaked the documents did so “in bad faith and unfairly”.

According to the standards rules of negotiation, he explained, information exchanged during negotiation is supposed to be confidential. Nothing should be relayed to a third party without the written consent of the other side.

“So to the extent that this information finds its way out, clearly something is wrong. The end result is that it mars the negotiation process, it creates mistrust… So the leakage, I think is regrettable.”

Credit: myjoyonline.com

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daniel russell