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The New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament (MP) for Adansi Asokwa and former Deputy Minister for the Interior, Mr. K. T. Hammond, has defended the decision taken by the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) to arrest three suspects standing trial for various narcotic offences, at the premises of an Accra Magistrate Court last week Thursday. Messrs Daniel Djabaah, Eric Owusu Manu and Frank Bruno Pappoe, the suspects, were granted bail by the Magistrate Court, presided over by Ellen Anokye last week Thursday, after appearing before it for sometime. As part of the bail conditions, the suspects were to surrender their passports, and also post a bail bond of GH�10,000 each. But, before the suspects could fulfill the bail conditions, personnel of the BNI went to the court premises and attempted to re-arrest them. This resulted in a scuffle that forced the magistrate to abandon her court sitting to intervene, insisting that her orders must be obeyed. In the end, the police had to take custody of the suspects, pending the resolution of the impasse. Commenting on the issue during a radio discussion programme on Citi FM on Saturday, K.T. Hammond said he did not see anything wrong with the decision taken by the BNI to re-arrest the three suspects. According to him, the magistrate erred in first place in granting bail to the suspects, since narcotics is one of the non-bailable offences in our statute books. He contended that even if the bail was lawful, the BNI had every right to re-arrest the suspects if they had a new case on which they must be interrogated. He contended that the seizure of their passports, which could restrict their movements, was not enough grounds to condemn the BNI for trying to re-arrest the suspects, �because not all people travel on passports,� and cited the case of refugees to buttress his point. Mr. K.T. Hammond also disagreed with Mr. Kwame Akuffo, an Accra-based legal luminary, that even though narcotic offences are non-bailable, judges could sometimes use their discretion to grant bail, because the constitution itself, which the criminal code is subservient to, gives the right for judges to grant bail. Speaking on Peace FM on Friday, Mr. Kwame Akuffo admitted that dealing in narcotics was one of the offences under the criminal code, where a court cannot grant bail to suspects involved. He, however, said since every law enacted by Parliament is subservient to the Constitution, and the fact that the latter guarantees the right to bail, the magistrate did not err in granting bail to the suspects. Another legal luminary and a lecturer at the Ghana School of Law, Mr. Maxwell Opoku Agyemang, also argued on Adom FM, the same Friday, that the inclusion of narcotics as one of the non-bailable offences was a dangerous decision, because it could be abused. He noted that if a powdered substance is found in one�s possession, which might not be a narcotic drug, the police can use the non-bailable clause in the Criminal Code to deny the accused person bail, on the flimsy excuse that the police were still investigating the case. According to him, it was as a result of the above that some of them opposed the law, but Parliament went ahead to enact it. The Adansi Asokwa MP, however, disagreed with these positions, contending that if the Constitution can override laws enacted by Parliament, as espoused by Mr. Kwame Akuffo, then there was no need to maintain the non-bailable laws in our statute books, and that they should rather be expunged. He noted that before the New Patriotic Party (NPP) assumed the reins of the country, narcotics was not one of the non-bailable offences, but their attempt to fight the drug war compelled them to introduce it. On the fears that the law could be abused, K.T. noted that if prosecutors in drug-related cases are unduly delaying the case, while keeping the suspects in custody, a counsel can make submission for the court to discharge the suspects on the grounds that the police were not interested in prosecuting the case.�Justice delayed, is justice denied,� he added. Mr. K.T. Hammond noted that he handled a similar case in the United Kingdom, and when he realised that the police were unduly delaying the case, he made a submission for the case to be struck out, which was upheld by the court. The opposition MP further told his listeners that he does not do politics when it comes to matters of law, and would always state the facts. The attempted arrest of the aforementioned suspects generated heated legal debates as to whether the magistrate who took that decision was clothed with enough powers to take the decision that she took. Whilst most speakers argued that the judge was right, others argued in opposition, and even questioned the attempt made by Ellen Opoku to prevent the BNI from carrying out its duty.