...I lost four companies, three cars while in detention
A businessman on Tuesday told the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) in Accra that he lost his four companies and three cars as a result of four years' of unlawful detention after returning from his home country of Lebanon where he lived for six years following his alleged complicity in an alleged coup.
"All my 40 years of toil have evaporated", Sammy Nasiri Nicholas Nasser told the NRC. He said his petitions to a number of institutions had yielded little or no positive results. Nasser expressed thanks to God for his care and sustenance, his wife and children, especially his son Nicholas and Archbishop Dominic Andoh, Catholic Bishop of Accra, and other Ghanaians who supported him when he was in distress.
Nasser did not make any request to the Commission, but said he left his plight for the consideration of the Commission. Led in evidence by Edward Mingle, Nasser told the Commission that in 1982, he engaged Kwame Pianim, an Economic Consultant, to secure financial assistance from the Bank for Credit and Commerce for his electrical company.
Not long after that Pianim was alleged to be involved in a coup attempt to oust the then Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC). Nasser said he travelled to Lebanon and in his absence, a news report in the Daily Graphic newspaper named him as a conspirator in Pianim's alleged coup attempt.
His four companies and his vehicles - Mercedes Benz car, BMW, Volvo and an American car - were confiscated to the state. He said that Kofi Djin, one time Secretary for the Interior, used one of the cars and one Tony Gbeho, formerly of the Bureau of National Investigation (BNI) also used one.
He said the American car was later returned to him. Nasser said his family advised him not to return to Ghana. However, he returned in 1998, and in the company of his lawyer reported at the office of the then National Security Co-ordinator, Naval Captain Baafour Assasie Gyimah (Rtd) to clear his name of the allegations.
Nasser said after sitting for one hour without anyone attending to him in Capt. Assasie-Gyimah's office, some soldiers drove him to the BNI Charge Office, where he was stripped to his pants.
He said he had neither water nor food in the cells and slept on the bare cement floor for three days. Nasser said he developed hernia and was sent in a van without a window to the Police Hospital for treatment.
He said after initial laboratory tests he was driven to the theatre for surgery, which could not come off because the theatre was not functioning and there was no bed. Nasser said he was sent to the BNI and Capt. Assasie-Gyimah and Peter Nanfuri, ex-boss of the BNI, came to interrogate him on why he had returned to Ghana without staying permanently in Lebanon. He said Mr Nanfuri slept for almost 30 minutes during the questioning.
Nasser said he was sent to the BNI Annex where he spent six weeks. Back to the BNI, he said Capt. Assasie Gyimah pressurised him to denounce his Ghanaian citizenship but he never succumbed.
He said he was transferred to the James Fort Prison, and then to the Nsawam Prsion, where he again developed hernia. When he pleaded to be sent to hospital, B. T. Baba said it was not safe for security reasons at the time, which was during the Non-Aligned Conference Meeting.
Nasser said he was transferred to the James Fort Prison, where he had severe bouts of malaria. He also had massive pressure from Nanfuri to renounce his Ghanaian citizenship, but he again refused.
He said Nana Ato Dadzie, who was handling his wife's petition to the then Chairman Jerry John Rawlings to have him released did not even want to see her again. Nasser said after his release, he petitioned a number of state institutions including the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice, but the Commission informed him that the part about his confiscated assets should be directed to the Attorney General's Department. He said he had personally given a copy of his petition to the Attorney -General and Minister of Justice, but was yet to have a reply.
During cross-examination Capt. Asssie-Gyimah asked Nasser why he reported himself upon his return from Lebanon. Nasser replied that he did so because he was a responsible citizen who was reacting to his name being mentioned in a coup attempt.
Capt. Assasie-Gyimah asked Nasser if he asked the late General Ankrah to intercede on his behalf to which Nasser replied yes. Nasser admitted that one Abu Baba came to his house but denied a suggestion that Abu Baba had come to collect sacs of money to finance a coup attempt.
Nasser, who said he and Capt. Assasie-Gyimah had hugged each other when they met at the Commission, said he had no animosity towards him. The Most Reverend Charles Palmer-Buckle, a member of the Commission asked Nasser, who clutched a briefcase, which he said, was full of records of the events at the BNI interrogations room, to publish his records for the education of Ghanaians.
Hearing continues.
