According to Citi News, 33 people were arrested last week for vandalising properties belonging to the Golden Star Wassa Mine in Benso, Western Region. The illegal miners are said to have set ablaze 12 vehicles, including excavators, ambulances, and pick-up trucks, forcing the company’s employees to flee for their lives.

Gerard Hillary Osei Boakye, the company’s Head of Group Corporate Affairs, earlier told Citi News how they were attacked.

“We usually do our patrols to protect our concession which is required of us by law to be responsible for our boundaries and also prevent incursions, to make sure that community people, hunters, and farms are safe. On one such occasion which was Thursday, March 16, we encountered some illegal miners encroaching, we engaged them as part of our modus operandi and told them to move away”.

“They were interested in that area, so they came back and when they came back, we tried to ward them off with the help of the police. They dispersed again and apparently unconfirmed report reaching us is that they may have been injured in the cause of being dispersed. That probably infuriated them, and they came back to torch our vehicles and ran our security post down, destroyed our offices, basically burnt things down,” he explained.

Source: citinewsroom.com

Ernest Henry Norgbey, Member of Parliament (MP) for the Ashaiman Constituency, has called for the formation of an independent committee of enquiry to investigate the invasion of some military men in Ashaiman following the death of a soldier in the area, Trooper Imoro Sherrif.

According to him, the Committee must be able to identify all of the officers and bring them to justice for dehumanising the area’s innocent residents.

According to Ernest Norgbey on Citi News, once formed, the committee will be able to solve all of the mysteries surrounding the soldiers’ invasion.

“This is the only way we can unravel the mystery surrounding the invasion. The Military High Command has admitted that it sanctioned the invasion and for what purpose it sanctioned the invasion is another matter that we have to delve into. When that is done, it won’t be peculiar to Ashaiman but recommendations that will be made will prevent military invasion in other communities”, he said.

Military personnel stormed Ashaiman with helicopters and armoured vehicles on Tuesday, March 7, 2023, to brutalise civilians following the death of a military officer who was stabbed in the town on Saturday, March 4, 2023.

In a statement, the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) justified the brutality, saying that the raid was not to avenge the soldier’s death, but to apprehend the perpetrators of heinous crimes.

GAF announced that the swoop had been approved by its high command. During the swoop, the military arrested 184 suspects, but they were all later released.

The key suspects in the murder of Imoro Sheriff were apprehended by the police after a week of a sustained intelligence-led operation.

The arrest was made solely on the basis of police intelligence, with no military involvement. Members of Parliament from the Defence and Interior Committees, as well as the Ministry of Defence and the Military High Command, will visit the Ashaiman community later this week as part of their investigation into the disturbing development.

Source: citinewsroom.com

Some Wa residents gathered today, March 10, at the Upper West Regional Coordinating Council’s forecourt to demand the release of the body of a 28-year-old man who was allegedly killed by police on March 8.

The residents, who are mostly young people, also demanded that the police clear the deceased of any wrongdoing before releasing the body for burial.

The young man, Abubakari Shahid, was killed by members of the Ghana Police Service’s anti-robbery unit for allegedly being a member of a robbery syndicate.

The angry residents, on the other hand, maintain that the deceased was not guilty of the crime charged against him.

The Regional Police Command has not yet issued an official statement in response to the allegations.