Police arrest 9 suspects for robberies on forex bureaux

A group of nine suspected robbers have been arrested by police in connection to raids at several forex bureaux at Spintex in the Greater Accra region, Inspector General of Police (IGP), David Asante Appeatu has revealed.

“I can assure you that just yesterday [Monday], we arrested about nine people who have all confessed to the robberies on the Spintex road. This you did not know but this is what we have done on the back end and we have results,” he said during a speech at a forum organized by the American Chamber of Commerce Ghana.

He assured the public and businesses that the police will do its best to protect lives and properties adding “the investigations that we do after robbery cases may not be known to you but in the back-end, we do a lot”.

The news comes after the Ghana Association of Forex Bureaux said its members are living in constant fear following incessant armed robbery attacks on them in Accra and Tema.

This year alone, over 20 forex bureaux have so far been attacked by armed robbers in Accra and Tema in the Greater Accra Region.

While most of the robbers carried out their attacks at night when the operators had closed, a number of them, on the other hand, displayed sheer bravado by holding operators hostage in broad daylight and made away with their safes containing cash, the Finder Newspaper reported earlier.

The disclosure by the IGP will come as a relief to the operators. However, the daylight robberies continue to be staged by armed attackers.

The situation was no different on Tuesday, 27 February 2018, when gun-wielding assailants numbering about 10, robbed the Royal Motors, an automobile company in Accra of cash and other valuables.

An eyewitness narrated that the robbers followed a bullion van to the premises around the Industrial Area. The cashier was supposed to collect some monies to be transported by the bullion van.

Soon after the van parked at the premises, the robbers attacked the cashier who alighted from the van to collect the daily sales from the company. The masked men also attacked a security man at post and the secretary of the firm amidst firing of gunshots and made away with GHS 8000 from the secretary's office.

The robbers also stole a motorbike and left the premises within minutes before the police were called in.