DCE goes on the rampage!

* Arrests chiefs, assemblymen on assassination ‘wolf cry’
Hon. Andrews Kwesi Teye, the embattled Manya Krobo District Chief Executive (DCE), who had since last year been swimming in a sea of bribery and other scandalous allegations, and whose fate is currently in the balance, has gone haywire and thus thrown his party’s usual diplomatic troubleshooting style to the dogs.

And with the ferocity of a dying buffalo, Teye, virtually turned into a ‘demolition man’, had started firing on sight at real and imagined enemies alike, even to the detriment of his already fragmented party in the district.

This is because, two weeks after hosting a people’s assembly in the district, during which all citizens were supposed to bare their minds with the executive arm of government, a chief, who expressed disgust at the DCE’s sidelining attitude towards the traditional council, is now being quizzed by the police, alongside seven others, for allegedly plotting to assassinate the DCE.

The Chronicle gathered that at the public forum on Tuesday, January 13 this year, Nene Domesiakor II, Susui divisional chief and acting president of the Manya Krobo Traditional Council, pointed out that Teye had, since his inception in office, distanced himself from the chiefs so much that people had started reading various meanings into the cold relationship; one of which was to the effect that the traditional authority had ill motives against the assembly and the chief executi

ve. He therefore called on the DCE to respect traditional authority and respond whenever they called him for a meeting.

The paper can say that, 15 days after that incident (Wednesday, January 28), a team of investigators from the Homicide Unit of the Police CID, led by Superintendent Patrick Agbetornyor, arrived with a ‘hit list’ of people purported to be holding secret meetings to kill the DCE. Interestingly the list included the name of the ‘vociferous’ chief.

The ‘hit list’ also included the names of Nene Bana Abledu II, Asafoatse of Kodjonya, Nene Offei Bonsu III, Asafoatse of Agbom Sisi and Nene Apo of Saisi.

Others were Mr. J.O. Kofi, immediate past Presiding Member of the assembly, and now secretary to the Krobo Youth Congress, a think tank of progressives in the area and Hon. Andrews Madjitey Kpabitey, New Patriotic Party (NPP) Constituency Youth Organizer responsible for Lower Manya Krobo and assembly member for Odumase South electoral area.

The rest were Hons. Rudolph Tetteh Baah and Dadematse John Lawer Djembi (members for Manyakpongunor West and Takorase/Osonson electoral areas respectively).

In fact many find the list rather bizarre in the sense that Djembi, the assemblyman who raised the ?8.2 million bribery alarm and had since been cooperating with security agents from Castle Annex (Blue Gate), is now being seen as a threat to the life of the DCE, when he (Djembi) was rather targeted and publicly threatened a couple of times for daring to exposing corruption in the assembly.

By 11.00am Asafoatse Bana, Kpabitey, Kofi and Baah were picked from their repective homes, and at the Odumase police station, they were grilled for hours on end after they were officially told that they were under arrest, based on an alarm they had had from the district that they were among a group plotting to assassinate the DCE.

The remaining four could not be arrested either for health reasons or that they were not at home. Word was, however, left for them to report either to the Odumase police or at the 4th Floor of the CID Headquarters in Accra.

Apart from the chief, the rest were made to write statements, after which they were granted self-cognizance bail.

Hon. Baah told this reporter that he was accused of holding meetings at the palace of the Konor of Manya Krobo, Nene Sackitey II, and was also quizzed about who had been siphoning information to The Chronicle concerning recent publications of the stinking rot at the assembly, otherwise known in the area as ‘The Chop Chop.’

“I have never stepped in the Konor’s palace. The last time I set eyes on him was at the Ngmayem durbar grounds last year October, when he sat in state and addressed the people,” he said.

Baah again told this reporter that Supt. Agbetorwor told him that Castle Security had informed him that he (Baah) once resisted the arrest of Djembi when they came for him at Odumase. But he denied this charge, saying, “If it was true why didn’t they arrest me, but returned to Accra only to ask the Homicide Unit to come and question me on that issue?”

For his part, Asafoatse Bana, said even though he was not asked to write any statement, he was equally arrested and officially informed of being a suspect in the matter, and that he would be invited to Accra when the need rose.

“I was sick and asked my brother to represent me at the station but they refused and came for me from my palace in their official Peugeot car and charged me accordingly,” he lamented.

He said his image had been tarnished by the charge and assured his accusers that the matter would not rest until his dignity had been restored.

Nene Offei said he only asked the policeman who came to invite him to the station to pass his invitation through the proper channel (the traditional council), and when he left he never came back.

The divisional chief, Nene Siakor, whose contribution at the people’s assembly apparently did not go down well with the organizers, only smiled at this reporter and said, “They say they are investigating, so let them go ahead.”

The arrests had sent ripples all over town as at the weekend, with many foretelling grave political consequences for the party in the general elections.

A woman NPP activist at Agormanya told The Chronicle that if the DCE could claim that his party’s youth organizer could be said to be plotting with chiefs and other opinion leaders against him then it was unfortunate.

“How can you harass chiefs, assembly members, opinion leaders and prominent persons like these in an election year, when their support is so vital to us? This is strange we cannot campaign through them again in December,” she contended.

Another disturbed member, Edmund Angmor, was not pleased with the development for the simple reason that it stood to erode all the political gains so far chalked in terms of good governance and the people’s confidence in the party.

He revealed that as far as he was concerned, Teye’s greatest failure is his inability to unite the party for all the years that he has been in office.

“He couldn’t bring us together and he is scattering the few committed ones in the fold,” he complained.

Meanwhile, sources close to the traditional council have hinted The Chronicle that the Konor, now in the United States of America, would definitely not take the matter lightly, more so when his person, his palace and divisional and sub-chiefs are being directly connected to an alleged plot to murder a political figure.

The source noted further that this allegation is the first of its kind in the area and Nene Sackitey, being a school mate of the President, John Agyekum Kufuor, in their Prempeh College youthful days, would certainly not be pleased with the development.