Gonja DCE Must Go 'Now'

A group calling itself NPP Network in Gonjaland is demanding the instantaneous removal of the district chief executive for East Gonja, Hon Luckman Mohammed Amin for supervising the spate of violence that has characterized the area in recent times. In a fragmented account press release signed by its communications director, Fred Tahiru the group is also calling for the transfer of three public officers including the divisional police commander, ASP Simon Amenu. The two others are the director of Ghana Education of the area, Mr. Adam Seidu Dauda and Master of the T.I Ahmadiyya Senior School, Mr.Mumuni Dumbei for various forms of professional blunders that has threatened the security of the area. According to them, failure to heed to their demand, they would be compelled to advice themselves. Below is the statement..... PRESS STATEMENT ON THE DETERIORATING SECURITY SITUATION IN THE EAST GONJA DISTRICT BY THE NPP NETWORK IN GONJA LAND Ladies and gentlemen of the media, we are so grateful to you for honoring our invitation to cover this Press Conference which touches on a wide range of security issues with serious implications in the East Gonja District. Ladies and gentlemen, permit me to take you through memory lane. On July 19th, 2015, two brothers from Bunkpa, Sibiku Moale 30 and Imoro Moale 25 were abducted and taken to an unknown location and killed in a barbarous manner. Their bodies were later conveyed to a location near the Kpembe dam where they were dumped. Three days later, their decomposed bodies were discovered and hurriedly buried on the same spot without a postmortem. This issue nearly sparked security upheavals between the people of Bunkpa and Kpembe, but for the high level of maturity exhibited by the two sides. My dear friends of the media, again, on 29th of July, 2015, riot broke out on the campus at the T.I Ahmadiyya Senior High School in Salaga. The headmaster of the school, Mr. Issah Mumuni Dumbie, unilaterally invited the police to quell a minor students' riot. The police, upon arrival, arrested some of the students indiscriminately and kept them in police custody. The students later mobilized to get their busted colleagues released from an unlawful custody, leading to an opened confrontation between the police and the students. The police opened fire on the armless and harmless students, resulting in the killing of one Francis Togbedu, a native of Mankango, who had come to the Credit Union to withdraw money that faithful day. Later on in the night that same day, armed and boot wearing police cum military officers, acting on the orders of the District Chief Executive of East Gonja, Hon. Lukman Mohammed Amin, stormed a mosque in Salaga where a group of revered Islamic Clerics (Mallams) were performing a Qur�anic recitation rituals on the instructions of the Kpembewura and manhandled them in very inhumane ways like wanton criminals including pulling of their ears in a student - master fashion. In fact, some of these revered men of God were even made to roll on a dusty floor. The same night, residents of Dagombaline and Muskai, which are suburbs of Salaga, had their privacies invaded by armed officers who forcefully broke into their rooms and physically assaulted them. Ladies and gentlemen, this was more than an assault on the structure of the mosque and the Mallams. It was an assault and a sacrilegious attack on the very foundation of Islam and freedom of worship. RECOMMENDATIONS In view of all these, the NPP NETWORK IN GONJALAND is unsatisfied with the way such minor security issues were handled in the East Gonja District and wish to recommend the following to ensure peace in the area as there is an easy calm in the District as a result: 1. The Headmaster of T.I Ahmadiyya, Mr. Issah Mumuni Dumbie, who is now an absentee in the school since the incident (Absent Without Leave), should be transferred from the school for peace to prevail. 2. The District Director of Education should also be transferred for having violated GES's rules by closing the school down after 6pm and giving the students a 15 minutes' ultimatum to vacate campus leading to some female students seeking refuge and passing the night in drinking spots. 3. The East Gonja Divisional Police Commander, who upon the orders of the DCE ordered his men to use live ammunitions on unarmed students, should also be transferred from the District so that he can practice his primitive crowd control tactics elsewhere. 4. The Network also demands the immediate removal of the DCE for East Gonja, Lukman Mohammed Amin, from office for the various roles he played in bringing the name of Salaga into such a bad light. 5. The Police Officer who shot and killed Francis Togbedu should be arrested immediately just like the way that the alleged killers of the two Chokosis were arrested with speed and made to confront the laws of our land. 6. A compensation package must be advanced to the wife and children of the late Francis Togbedu to appease them of their loss. Ladies and gentlemen, as the tortured souls of our three (3) brothers look up to the Good Lord for redress, the NPP NETWORK IN GONJALAND will want to convey its heartfelt condolence to the Moale family in Bunkpa and the Togbedu family in Mankango. We are with them in these hard times. Ladies and gentlemen, in conclusion, let me warn that if these recommendations are not heeded to, the Network will have no option than to advice itself. This should, however, not be interpreted to mean a threat. This is our format of expressing our dissatisfaction and disgust on the way and manner some basic security issues are being handled in the District by the DCE. Thank you for coming. It is our conviction that you will serve as vehicles to convey these concerns to the general public and those who matter.