Police rescues VAT official's daughter

Fiapre (B/A), Nov. 9, GNA - Brong-Ahafo Regional Office of Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU) of the Police last Wednesday rescued a kindergarten one pupil who was found locked up in a room by the father instead of being in school.

A team of police personnel of the unit led by Deputy Superintendent of Police Kwaku Amoako, regional coordinator, broke into the room and found the girl lying naked on the floor with bruises all over her body and a big wound on her forehead.

The victim is said to have frequently been maltreated and sometimes locked up by his father, Mr. Nuhu Nkrumah Dauda, Operational Manager of the Regional office of the Value Added Tax (VAT) in Sunyani, who has since been arrested and placed in police custody.

Mr Amoako told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that the unit received a complaint that the victim had been abused and locked up indoors for six days by her father.

When contacted the headmaster of Presbyterian Primary School at Fiapre, near Sunyani, confirmed that the victim had not been attending school. The regional co-ordinator said a police team went to the VAT office where they were told that Mr. Nuhu had gone out and when called on his phone "he asked us to wait at his office but he failed to come".

Mr Amoako said this made him and his officers to go to Nuhu's residence and broke into the room to rescue the victim.

He gave the assurance that DOVVSU would investigate the matter thoroughly and arraign the suspect.

Some residents told the GNA that Mr. Dauda frequently abused his daughter who could not speak "twi" properly, without any reason. "He sometimes hits the child's head against a wall, refuses to give her food and will lock her up in a room for days", a neighbour said. He said at the end of the third quarter of this year the unit had recorded 450 cases of child non-maintenance, representing 80 per cent of cases brought before it. Mr Amoako appealed to the general public to provide information about child abuse and other related cases to the Unit for action to be taken.