Probe death of Kplembare - Directors

Bunso (Eastern Region), 1st July 99 - The Conference of the District Directors of Agriculture Ghana has appealed to President Jerry John Rawlings through the Minister of Food and Agriculture to probe the circumstances under which Mr Morris Kplembare, the Director of Agriculture for Bole in the Northern Region, was killed. A statement issued at Bunso Cocoa College on Wednesday and presented to Mr Johnson Asiedu-Nketia, a Deputy Minister of MOFA, appealed to the President to investigate the incident and bring the culprit to book.

Dr J.H.O. Bannerman, Interim Vice-President of the conference, signed the statement.

The statement protested at what it described as the ''brutish and barbaric behaviour of EX-WO1 Ebenezer Quaynor of the National Security Council, Castle Annex,' alleged to have shot the deceased in traffic at Achimota. Mr Asiedu-Nketia expressed the Ministry's condolences to the bereaved family and said MOFA was shocked by the incident.

He told the Directors from the Eastern, Volta and Ashanti Regions on a 12-day training programme at the college that their petition would be handed over to the President. He, however, said that since this was purely a murder case, it would be dealt with by the courts and urged them to have faith in the judiciary since justice would be done.

An EX-Warrant Officer of the Ghana Army, alleged to be working at Castle annex shot and killed Mr Kplembare. The deceased was said to have left the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA) where he was on course on Thursday, June 24, to complete his research project work at Pokuase, near Accra. While returning to GIMPA late that day, his vehicle was allegedly hit by that of the EX-Warrant Officer.

An argument ensued which resulted in EX-Warrant Officer Quaynor allegedly shot and killed Mr Kplembare instantly, claiming that he (Quaynor) had killed an armed robber.