Soldiers asked for GHS50,000 to overthrow Akufo-Addo’s government
Staff Sergeant Sule Awarf, a prosecution witness in the treason trial of ten people, including seven soldiers, has told the Accra High Court hearing the case that soldiers recruited to carry out the purported overthrow of government requested GHS50,000.00 in cash apiece.
Sule, who, as directed by his superiors, captured all of the events of the purported overthrow plan on audio and video, stated the sum covered their help both during and after the exercise.
Led by Mrs Yvonne Atakorah Obuobisa, Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), in his evidence-in-chief, Sule said he was contacted in 2019 by Warrant Officer Class Two (WO2) Esther Saan, the only female among the accused persons in the treason trial, about the intended plot by Dr Frederick Yao Mac Palm.
He then met Bright Allan Debrah, alias BB, at the Next Door Beach Resort-Teshie, who introduced him to Mac Palm, the Chief Executive Officer of the Citadel Hospital in Alajo, who (Mac Palm) persuaded him (Sule) that the incumbent government had failed the country, in addition to the National Democratic Congress.
Sule and Esther were asked to help recruit security personnel to assist the process, with the promise that if the goal was met, they would be given positions in his administration, according to the Court, which was presided over by Justices Afia Serwaa Asare-Botwe, Hafsata Amaliba, and Stephen Oppong.
Mac Palm also persuaded them that democracy was bad for Ghana since the country had lost its discipline and that only the military could restore it.
Staff Sergeant Sule went on to say that because he had travelled to South Sudan and seen the negative effects of the coup d’etat there, as well as not wanting his name to be associated with the plotters, he informed one Colonel retired Ansu, his former boss, who directed him to Major General Omane Agyekum, his commandant, and then to Major General Andoh, Director General of Intelligence.
He was asked to pretend to be interested in their activities and was given both audio and video devices to record all of their activities whenever he attended their meetings, explaining that their meetings were mostly attended by WO2 Esther, Bright, and Corporal Sylvester Akanpewe, and they were given cellular phones with sim cards for communication among the group members, noting that at one point, Mac Palm gave executive members a GHC50.00 credit.
Sylvester Akanpewe went to the meeting with Staff Sergeant Naziem and Sergeant Zakari Rahim, while Staff Sergeant Naziem and Sergeant Zakari Rahim went with one Nii Ankrah, Lance Corporal Ali Solomon, and Corporal Abubakar Sadique, according to Sule.
In their meetings, they discussed the number of soldiers to be recruited, a sketch map of key installations to be targeted, where to keep the President and his administrators if they were captured, acquiring weapons, and the soldiers’ welfare, among other things. In one meeting, WO2 suggested that the President be eliminated rather than held in an unfinished building at Adentan Housing, as Sule had suggested.
When it came to obtaining guns, Sule said Mac Palm initially informed him he had Policemen in Kotobabi and the Eastern area who could supply them, but when those security guys failed, he resorted to Donyo Kafui, alias Ezor, the blacksmith from Alavanyo. He claimed Mac Palm forced him (Sule) to do it.
He further informed the Court that he was aware of Ezor’s activities from the time he was handed GHC7,000.00 by Mac Palm to buy weapons supplies, until the time he had constructed a number of handguns and IEDs and video filmed the manufacturing process.
According to the prosecution witness, Ezor called him again in his presence to purchase an AK 47 to add to the stock of weapons, and when he realized Ezor had finished his work and was about to return to Alavanyo, he informed his boss, who asked him to delay Ezor, which led to the accused persons’ arrest when they went to test the weapons at the Military Shooting Range, Teshie.
Mac Palm, Ezor, BB, Johannes Zikpi, Colonel Samuel Kojo Gameli, WO2 Esther, Corporal Abubakar, Lance Corporal Ali Solomon, Sylvester Akanpewe, and Assistant Commissioner of Police Benjamin Korsi Agordzo are facing high treason charges and have been granted bail.
Source: Richard Mensah Adonu | Join our Telegram Group
