Castle Policeman Is Dead

Information reaching the news desk of Daily Guide indicates that a member of the Special Elite Police Unit recently posted to the Osu Castle has been killed a few days after he was sent to the seat of government. Castle security sources hinted that the police officer, popularly known as Abu, met his untimely death when he engaged some armed robbers in a shoot-out on the Accra-Aflao road last Saturday morning.

Not only was he gunned down; his fully-loaded pistol was also taken away by the robbers as part of the loot. Abu, according to deep-throat sources, was among a group of passengers that ran into a roadblock mounted by suspected armed robbers near Bundase on the dawn of Saturday. The young police officer, whose rank is yet to be established, was recently transferred from the Volta Region to Accra, and was among the first batch of Very, Very Important Personnel (VVIP) protection unit put together for the Castle under the President Mills administration.

According to his colleagues, Abu, who was armed with a loaded pistol, tried to engage the robbers in a showdown, but he was not fast enough as the robbers, with more sophisticated weapons, gunned him down and virtually emptied barrels of their guns in his tummy. He was reportedly travelling to visit his wife in the Volta Region when he met his untimely death.The bullet-ridden body of the fallen officer has reportedly been deposited at the Police Hospital for autopsy.

When the paper contacted him for his comments on the unfortunate incident, the Second-In-Command of the Castle Police, ASP Bawa, said the Police Public Relations Unit would be the best to comment and hung up. DSP Kwesi Ofori, Director of the Police Public Affairs Directorate, could not be reached as at press time yesterday. Daily Guide gathered that the news of Abu’s death has sent shivers down the spine of security personnel at the Castle in view of a series of deaths that have rocked the country in recent times.

The paper is also informed that the Mills administration is damned embarrassed over the development, more so when the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), in its campaign message ahead of the last general elections, boasted of wiping out armed robbery in the country.