PHOTO: Father Hacks Daughter

Residents of Waali-Sombo within the Wa Municipality of the Upper West Region on Saturday woke up to a gory scene after a 62-year-old man, Yelminga Dong Basinaa, butchered his six-year-old daughter to death. The man as well committed suicide after the heinous crime. The shocked residents were tight-lipped over the matter, wondering what could have pushed him to commit such a barbaric act. According to pieces of information gathered by DAILY GUIDE, Yelminga Dong Basinaa had accused his wife, a certain Akua Erah, of infidelity. This was reported to have degenerated into a heated argument between the couple, and the man, in a fit anger, attempted to kill his wife; and when that failed, he vented his spleen on the poor girl. He inflicted several machete wounds on her head, following which the six-year-old bled profusely and died. The suspect tried killing himself by drinking a substance in a bottle, believed to be hydrogen peroxide. When that did not work, he pulled out a sharp knife and tried to slash his throat, but was rescued by neighbours following the alarm raised by his son, one Basinaa Fidelis. The Wa police, led by police detective, Francis Alowise, were immediately called to the crime scene where they picked the six-year-old deceased, Erica, to the Wa Hospital morgue for autopsy while the suspect was also taken to the casualty ward for medical attention and placed under police guard. He however died on admission in view of some complications as a result of the havoc caused to his system by the substance he gulped. Police confirmed to DAILY GUIDE that investigations had commenced to establish whether the man at the centre of the incident had a history of a mental illness. The widow and Basinaa Fidelis, her son, were reported to be traumatized over the deaths and were inconsolable when news broke. The family was yet to come to terms with the reality that it had lost two members on the dawn of last Saturday.