Hiplife star Nana Ekua Amoah, popularly known as Mzbel, would spend five more days in police custody following an order by an Accra Motor Court that she and two others be remanded for assaulting a police officer.
The celebrated Ghanaian songstress, together with Maxwell Mensah, a driver, and Emmanuel Edem Nordzor, a student, were charged before the magistrate court presided over by Emmanuel Plange Brew on various motor traffic offences and assault.
Mensah had four charges; namely unauthorized parking, causing road obstruction, resisting arrest and assaulting a police officer.
Nordzor was charged with driving a motor vehicle without licence while Mzbel was to face two charges of obstructing a police officer from executing a lawful duty and assaulting a police officer. They all pleaded not guilty to the offence.
Although their three lawyers had tried to secure bail for them, the prosecutor, Chief Inspector Seiwah Dora, insisted that they should be remanded because their action could have ended the life of the policeman.
Mr. Addo Atuah, lead counsel for the accused persons, in seeking bail, stated that the facts as presented by the police was at variance with what actually happened. According to him, it was the policeman who rather unleashed all sorts of brutalities on the accused persons.
This act of the police, he disclosed, had been recorded and it would be made available to the court later. He said Mzbel, as tinny and frail as she was, could not have assaulted the police officer as alleged.He informed the court that the accused persons who were gainfully employed, especially Mzbel, an international star, would offer substantial sureties if bail was granted. One of the lawyers had added that “the story has just been made up for an effect”.
However, Chief Inspector Seiwah objected to the application for bail, indicating that the accused persons wanted to kill the policeman. She contended that the driver of the vehicle drove off while the policeman was dramatically lying on the bonnet of the vehicle and refused to stop despite shouts from eyewitnesses.
“If not for the intervention of another person, the policeman would have been dead by now,” she stressed.
The police officer had since been treated and discharged from the Police Hospital. The prosecutor also indicated that Mzbel would abscond if granted bail as a supposed international star.
However, the lawyers insisted that an accused person could not be incarcerated on mere speculation that he or she would not be in court, pleading with the court to temper justice with mercy.
Although the magistrate, Mr Plange Brew, admitted that the offences were bailable, he said, “The indiscipline by the youth these days is too much and they must be checked”, after which he remanded the accused persons.
The facts, as narrated by the prosecutor, was that on Saturday at about 12.30pm, a police MTTU officer on duty at the Tudu traffic light in Accra realized there was heavy traffic on a section of the road which obstructed the free flow of vehicles.
The officer, in his attempt to identify the cause, realized it was caused by a Mitsubishi 4×4 vehicle with registration number GR9470-11, driven by one Emmanuel Nordzor and subsequently requested to see his licence.
After the cop’s inquiry, Emmanuel hurriedly left the driver’s seat and handed the vehicle over to Maxwell Mensah who rudely asked the policeman to clear off from the road for them to pass.
But the policeman, who was not deterred by the conduct, insisted on seeing the licence of Emmanuel.
Maxwell then ignored his request, started the vehicle and hit the cop, who fell on the bonnet of the vehicle while he drove off, regardless of what happened to the policeman.
They then drove for a distance, with the policeman still clung dangerously to the bonnet, while eyewitnesses screamed at the horror of what was happening.
It took a private security van, with a policeman on board, to block the Mitsubishi on the main road to ensure they never escaped.
When the vehicle eventually stopped, Mzbel allegedly got out of the Mitsubishi, and yelled at the cop, claiming he had no right to cross their path.
She allegedly got physical and held the uniformed policeman by the neck in an attempt to strangle him, while pushing a clenched fist in his face; but onlookers rushed to the rescue of the policeman.
Reports said when Mzbel realized she had fallen foul of the law, she started wailing, and claimed she was assaulted by the policeman instead, but onlookers started hooting at her.
The vehicle and its occupants were therefore taken to the MTTU headquarters where the three were arrested and subsequently processed for court.
The songstress however told Joy News that her personal assistant was sitting in the driver’s seat, after the driver had got out to pick something, when the police appeared, asking for the driver’s license- thinking the person sitting in the seat was the driver.
“I told them that he was not the driver and the driver came in, provided his license and the other policeman instructed us to go. As soon we moved the car, the other one dived on the bonnet of the car so we stopped. I rolled down [my glass] to ask him why he did that and he grabbed my driver’s suit struggling with him,” she explained.
She accused the police of assaulting her personal assistant and her driver. Mzbel also told Joy News the police acted in an unusual manner- jubilating and rejoicing the mistreatment meted to her, her driver and PA – and later rushed to the media to tell lies.
