Give his body to us for burial – enraged ex-president’s family demand
Angry family members of the late President John Evans Atta Mills are calling for the immediate relocation of the remains of the ex-president to his hometown in Ekumfi Otuam.
The family, could not hide its displeasure at the controversies surrounding the graveyard of Prof. Mills, which they had no foreknowledge of especially the renovation of the late president’s tomb.
Members of the family in Ekumfi Otuam said the remains of John Evans Atta Mills will be safer in his hometown.
“I am worried about the issues surrounding his tomb and burial. As a family, we are demanding that the body is brought back to us at Ekumfi Otuam for burial. It will even serve as a tourist attraction”.
The brother of late President John Evans Atta Mills, Samuel Atta Mills accused the Atta Mills Institute and the Coastal Development Authority of tampering with the tomb of the ex-president without recourse to the family.
Samuel Atta Mills said the act is culturally offensive, adding that the family does not recognize the act by the institute about the remains of the late president at the Asomdwee Park.
In less than three days, 10 years after the passing of the late President will be marked.
Samuel Atta Mills, who is also the Member of Parliament for Komenda-Edina-Eguafo Abirem, addressed the press in Parliament.
“A group calling itself Atta Mills Institute that the family doesn’t even recognize, and Coastal Development Authority, have gone to break the grave of President John Evans Atta Mills. They have removed the tomb, and they claim that they are rebuilding it.”
“My question is that we have a family tradition. Now that they have touched someone’s grave, is the body still in there? Who has the body? Why will you touch the body without informing the family head? Under whose authority? Why do they want us to always go through grief? This is a former president, why will the government allow this to happen? This is an insult to the family and the nation,” Samuel Atta-Mills added.
Ghana’s first Presidential mausoleum and burial ground of Ghana’s late President John Evans Atta Mills, the Asomdwee Park, is currently in a deplorable state.
There are reports that the park was no longer secure as its security had been left in a sorry state and no longer a secured place at least befitting enough for former leaders worth celebrating.
The condition of the park and the late President’s tomb is nothing to write home about, as some parts of the fencing protecting it have broken down.
