A 55-YEAR-OLD Ghanaian who was subjected to ruthless human rights abuses both at home and abroad at the hands of foreigners is seeking assistance from the international community to enable him access justice and compensation for the brutalities suffered as a result.
The pathetic story of Mr. Collins Fosu alias Samuel Emmanuel Opare, a native of Senfi near Ashanti Bekwai in Ghana, who has both arms amputated, started in 1980-1981 in far away Strasburg in France. Narrating his story, Mr. Fosu said he had a quarrel with a French doctor which landed him in the grips of the French police. As a result his bank account at the Sogenal Bank in Strasburg was withheld until he had cleared himself from the police.
According to him he had no option than to flee France to Holland where he worked with the World Trade Centre in Amsterdam for three years. Unfortunately, Collins as he was widely known in Europe was found out after three years and asked to produce a police report to clear him. Again his bank account at the Amrons bank was confiscated which situation compelled him to travel to Cairo in Egypt in 1993 where he secured employment and worked for a while, this time using a different name Samuel Emmanuel Opare to conceal his identity.
He lived at 12 Ahmed Essimat Street. In May 1994 he was involved in an industrial accident at a textile factory as a result of which his right arm was amputated.
The amputee says the Ghana Embassy in Cairo hired a lawyer for him and was able to obtain a judgment in his favour at a court of law which ordered his employers to pay him compensation for the injury sustained. Known as Opare now, he further narrated that despite the court¢s order the company refused to pay the compensation due him because it claimed he was not covered by the company¢s insurance policy. His lawyer could also not effect the execution of the court¢s order. He said instead of being compensated, he was arrested, brutalized and eventually deported to Ghana at a time a court of law had ruled in his favour for compensation from his employers. The returnee said while he was pursuing compensation claims, Cairo police officials wrongfully arrested and detained him in police custody for over a month for not possessing resident permit even though he had a valid resident permit. He said his resident permit and passport were produced on demand which documents are still with the Ain Sams Police. According to Opare, he was one morning awakened to his hospitalization at a Cairo hospital at a time he was in police custody. On gaining consciousnesses, he was told by officials of the Ghana Embassy in Cairo that he was involved in an accident resulting in the loss of his three fingers on his left arm. A police report of 2001 signed by Captain Ahmed Shawki of the Cairo Security department indicated that Opare was rushed to the Matareya Educational Hospital on August 21, 2001 with a thorn left hand which little finger, ring finger and the middle finger were severed. He was also suspected to have a cerebral concussion.
The said report indicated that Corporal Gomeah Mohammed Mostafa of Ain Shams Police station, who was escorting Opare to an Immigration office because he did not have a resident permit, claimed he had handcuffed Opare since his right hand had already been amputated.
The police officer reported that at the underground station Opare slipped and fell between the platform and the railway lines and that he was too lucky to have been saved by the police officer who pulled him from on coming train but not after the train had already chopped off his three fingers. Opare has doubted the police report and described it as strange because he was not conscious of any such incident involving him. All he remembers is that he regained consciousness in the hospital.
The amputee argues that there was no chance of survival if he had been run over by an underground train and described the police report as a fabricated one and an attempt to kill him in order to deny him of his claim to compensation.
According to Opare, he would have taken legal action against the Egyptian Police but was suddenly deported rendering him financially incapacitated to do so. He claims the Egyptian government is ignoring his demands three years after he had petitioned the Egyptian government through the local Embassy in Accra.
Mr. Opare complains that three years ago, he lodged a complaint with the Consular at the Egyptian Embassy in Accra, where one Osama requested that he (Opare) furnishes him (Osama) with police and hospital reports concerning his petition for the necessary action but to no avail.
According to Opare, efforts by an assistant legal director of the Foreign Affairs ministry in Accra, Madam Jane Gaasu to link up the Ghana Embassy in Cairo to take up the matter and expedite the processes had not yielded any positive result either.
He also complains that reminders upon reminders have not helped the situation to the surprise of officials at the both the Foreign Affairs ministry and the Egypt Embassy in Accra.
A petition to the President of the Republic of Ghana and one the Commission of Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) on March 17, 2008 have not yielded any positive results yet.
He has also appealed to philanthropists to assist him to pursue the case against the Egyptian police. Opare would as well appreciate assistance in the form of legal aid to pursue the case at the appropriate quarters to its logical conclusion.
A frustrated Opare who believes that the Foreign Ministry has not done enough to champion his cause in this regard has, therefore, reiterated his appeal to the International community for legal aid to pursue the case at the International Court of Justice at The Hague against the Egyptian police administration for alleged ruthless and inhuman treatment meted out to him while he was in Egypt.
He also wants assistance for the retrieval of his monies lodged in the French and Netherlands banks before he sojourned to Egypt in 2001 to bail him out of his current financial stress and plight.
Opare has since also petitioned the both the French Embassy in Accra and resident directorate of the European Commission in Accra form their intervention to retrieve his monies lodged in the French and Netherlands banks.
Opare who is currently back to base in Ghana since 2001, would appreciate any form of assistance regarding his plight. He can be reached on 00233-24-9534944 and through e-mail: fosu.collins@yahoo.com.
