Police praised for rescuing two Canadian girls

A cross section of Ghanaians have commended the Ghana Police Service for rescuing the two Canadian girls, Patricia Catherine Tilly and Bailey Jordan Chitty from their abductors yesterday but questioned the silence on the missing Takoradi girls.

According to some Ghanaians, though the rescue was commendable, they were of the view that the police should have placed the same level of seriousness and commitment exhibited in saving the Takoradi girls.

Mr. Selorm Mensah, 35 said in the case of the Takoradi girls, the police took issues lightly when reported to them until the third girl got missing and now it is being speculated that these girls are not in the country.

“If the Ghana Police Service had acted swiftly as they did with the case of the Canadian girls, the story of the Takoradi girls would have been different by now,” he said.

Though he was of the view that the situations were different because one case had to do with foreigners and the other Ghanaian nationals, the police and other security experts in the country could have done better in the case of the three Takoradi girls.

Mr Mensah praised the Police for redeeming the image of Ghana in international circles saying that, if the girls had not been rescued by now, the international media would have taken a swipe at Ghana.

For Komla Agbo, priority was given to the Canadian girls in an attempt to manage the international image of the country.

He questioned the rationale behind the Inspector General of Police (IGP) David Asante-Apeatu’s visit to Kumasi in an attempt to help find the two missing Canadian girls while he was yet to visit Takoradi to give a word of encouragement to the families of the three missing girls.

“I think the Police and government have given priority to the Canadians over our own nationals and I feel sad about it,” he said.

He called on the Police to put in more effort into finding the Ghanaian girls to erase the perception that the Canadian girls were rescued to save the image of the country.

A journalist with the Ghanaian Times newspaper, Mr John Vigah, said the police had done a good job as the issue of kidnapping was giving the country a bad name in the international community.

“As much as I want to congratulate the security forces, they deserve a lot of plaudits for the good work done but I want to charge them to do everything possible to ensure that the Takoradi girls are rescued and are reunited with their families whom I believe are going through enormous emotional torture these past months,” he said

Mr Agyenim Boateng, a Research Scientist, was of the view that the rescue of the Canadian girls clearly indicated how the country less regarded its citizens.

A visibly angry mobile money vendor, Elisabeth Ahiadzi, sai, the situation was heartbreaking and suggested the killing of the kidnappers while expressing her surprise at the use of taxpayers’ money to transport the “criminals” in an aircraft to Accra.

Ms Yayra Mensah, an accountant, said this clearly defined the disrespect of human rights we have in the country, stressing that the laws of the country seemed to only favour the rich whiles the poor always suffer.

“This is just too much just because the parents of these girls don’t have money to help find their children they are always in pain,” she said.

She asked the Police to ensure that the Takoradi girls were brought back home and reunited with their families as soon as possible.

Earlier this month two Canadian girls who were on an exchange programme with the entrepreneurship department of the Kumasi Technical University were kidnapped in Kumasi and were rescued at Akorem in Sawaba, a suburb of Kumasi by the Ashanti Regional Police Command in collaboration with other security operatives in the early hours of Wednesday.