Accra, Dec. 16, GNA- Mr Ben Ephson, Editor of the Daily Dispatch newspaper, on Tuesday stated that although he was very critical of military governments, plotting a coup was not his 'cup of tea'. He said one Major Acquah and a Mr John Chris Amamatey once approached him and told him that one Major Courage Quashigah wanted him to draft a speech for him.
The Major was to pick the speech from a polythene bag in his house at Kanda, while he was on his way to the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation studios.
Mr Ephson was reacting to allegations made against him by Mr Amamatey at a public hearing of the National Reconciliation Commission in Accra. He said after he had written the speech he realised that it was a set up and so he got out of the deal and reported Major Acquah and Mr Amamatey.
Mr Epshon, who said he was a Reporter for the BBC, AFP and the West Africa Magazine in 1990, told the Commission that he informed a fellow BBC Reporter Julian Marshall about the speech he wrote and then reported Major Acquah and Mr Amamatey to Commander Assasie Gyimah, a top security operative, after which he heard later that the two had been arrested. According to Mr Ephson, he had known both Major Acquah and Mr Amamatey, as very good "friends and close to the ex President".
Mr Amamatey, who described himself as former Head of Internal and General Security of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI), had alleged that Mr Ephson and another person had leaned on a standby vehicle and watched as soldiers beat him up in the night, in a bush, behind the La Trade Fair after he was arrested on January 31, 1990. Mr Epson said he never witnessed Mr Amamatey being brutalised, when he cross-examined Amamatey.
Mr Amamatey, who said he flew in from Holland to give evidence, said after his arrest at his workplace, soldiers from surveillance team went to his house at Kanda, searched his house and collected his passport and some foreign monies he had.
The Witness said he later read from a newspaper that he was arrested for destroying evidence of an earlier arrest.
He said was stripped to his pants at the Military Academy Guardroom, where he was initially detained and was later transferred in the night on the orders of Major Pattington then Operation Officer of the Gondar Barracks, who was with then with second officer in charge, Major Gbevlo Lartey.
The Witness said the soldiers continued to beat him severely as they drove him from the Military Academy to the bush, asking him to tell them all that he knew of Major Quashigah, who was then in the cells of the BNI, "else I would not come back home".
He said they hit him on the chest, waist and back with their weapons and iron chains as Major Pattington and Major Gbevlo Lartey watched on until he became unconscious.
Mr Amamatey said he was then taken to the Gondar Barracks, where the soldiers stamped on his feet and one sank pins into his hands, buttocks and thighs. They later took the pins back and used a blade to cut his arm.
He said he was later taken to Major Pattington's Office and Major Pattington ordered a soldier lying on a camp bed to put a knife in his nose.
"I felt choked in the heart, and I asked Major Pattington for water. He gave me a paper to write on but I was blank and could not write anything", the Witness said.
He said he was later blindfolded and dumped in the Five Battalion of Infantry Guardroom, where he said Major Pattington, one day offered him a half bucket of tea for his meal for the whole day.
Mr Amamatey said he was detained for one week and sent to back to the Military Academy Guardroom and then transferred to the Air Force Guardroom, he said he broke down, but was denied medical care. He said when he asked the soldiers to take him to hospital they said Major Pattington had told them that he would take him to the hospital himself but he never showed up.
He said he was later interviewed by four top BNI officials, including Brigadier Kpetoe, Commander Assassie Gyimah, Mr Peter Nanfuri, then BNI Director.
They asked him whether a suspect had told him about the role of Mrs Rawlings, on the murder of the three Judges, to which Witness said he replied in the affirmative.
Amamatey said he was detained for seven months adding that his salary, which Brig. Kpetoe said should be paid to him was discontinued after the sixth month.
Mr Amamatey said he was again detained at the BNI and later taken to the James Fort Prisons, where he shared a cell with armed robbers. He said he was in detention for two years and five months and after his release BNI Operatives kept surveillance on him so he fled the country.
His foreign monies including 150,000 pounds, some US dollars, and Dutch Marks, and some cedis, which he said he learned were given to Commander Assasie Gyimah were not returned to him.
He said his seized passport was also not returned to him and added that he turned down an offer from Mr Nanfuri to get him back into the BNI.
Professor Henrietta Mensa-Bonsu said Major Pattington had denied ever ordering soldiers to torture Mr Amamatey.
