Police mull over re-imposition of curfew

Commissioner of Police (COP) Nathan Kofi Boakye, the Ashanti Regional Commander, has threatened to recommend the re-imposition of curfew in Old-Tafo, Kumasi, amid rising tension in the community.

This comes as the residents grow in anger over unprovoked attacks on them by a group of Muslim youth and a bloody clash looms.

COP Boakye on Wednesday held separate meetings with the traditional authorities and elders of the Zongo Community, where he minced no words about the determination of the police to deal decisively with trouble makers.

He warned that they would not allow anybody to take the law into their own hands and act with impunity.

He called for the people to be bold to give out those out there to disturb the peace.

The meeting followed the slashing of one Kwadwo Antwi with a machete by people suspected to come from the Zongo on last Sunday, July 31.

The victim is reported to have suffered head wounds and deep cuts on different parts of the body, an incident, which prompted the indigenes to call a press conference to denounce the inaction of the police in the face of the lawlessness of the Zongo youth.

Old-Tafo was thrown into turmoil in the early part of this year, when a wall, which was being constructed by the Muslim youth around the Tafo cemetery was pulled down.

One person was killed and property running into millions of cedis destroyed in the heat of the violent confrontation between the indigenes and the Zongo settlers and a curfew was imposed.

COP Boakye gave the assurance that three persons arrested earlier by the police were going to be prosecuted and gave their names as “Scorpion”, “Jah Rule” and “Fulani”.

Nana Agyen Frempong Ababio, the Tafohene, who looked visibly angry and sounded very emotional, demanded that politicians stopped interfering in what were purely criminal matters.

He said the law must be allowed to take its course and that nobody or group should be made to feel that they were untouchable.

He said it was wrong for anybody to shield any law breaker for political reasons, adding that, that could only embolden them to continue their bad and reckless conduct.

He stated that the traditional council would do everything to protect the people in the event any attack.

Sheikh Mohammed Ameen, Deputy Director of Alzaaria Islamic School, who spoke on behalf of the Zongo Community, asked the youth to desist from violence telling them that Islam stood for peace.