Mahama boys beat nurses

Supporters of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) who were part of the entourage of President John Dramani Mahama, on Tuesday, descended heavily on students of the Sefwi Wiawso Nursing Training College (NTC) in the Western Region during his campaign tour of the area.

The students, numbering about 400, were on a float on some streets in the town as part of their SRC week celebration.

A source at the school told DAILY GUIDE that while on the float, the students were approached by some security details of President Mahama who asked them to make way for the convoy of the President.

The students, who were then close to a fuel filling station, gathered in front of the station waiting for the convoy to pass.

Moments later, the presidential convoy was said to have shown up.

Upon seeing the students, President Mahama was said to have emerged from his open-top vehicle to wave at them.

Some of the students were said to have started yelling ‘no Nana, no vote,’ a situation that seemed to have angered some supporters of the NDC who had also gathered by the roadside to cheer the president who accused the students of throwing water at him.

They were therefore thought to have been hired by Dr Kwaku Afriyie, a former Health Minister in the New Patriotic Party administration and a native of the place, to hoot at the President.

There and then, a number of them pounced on the student-nurses.

The students, according to the source, had to abandon the float as they dived for cover.

The NDC boys scattered the float and vandalized some of the vehicles meant for the float.

The irate NDC supporters were said to have pursued the students to the entrance of the school in a bid to ‘teach them some sense’ but were prevented by the security men on campus.

In the process, one of the students, Veronica, was said to have been injured and had to be rushed to the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) in Kumasi for treatment.

Two other persons were said to have been stripped naked and molested by the angry mob.

The marauding NDC faithful allegedly vandalized a blue Nissan pickup with registration number AS 4824-11, belonging to Tigo, the event sponsors.

That led to a suspension of the SRC week celebrations which have since resumed.

An official complaint has been made to the police.

Students of the Sefwi Wiawso Nursing Training College, some of whom live in hostels in town, are said to be living in fear, since according to one of the students who confirmed the incident to DAILY GUIDE, “right now when you take a car, you are afraid; you don’t know whether you are safe or not because if they see you in a white La Coste or in the school uniform, you are dead.”

Another student-nurse, who pleaded anonymity for fear of being victimized, said, “This is not the first attack; something similar happened when we went to do the biometric registration exercise because they think when we register here, we will vote for Afriyie so they came with cutlasses and bottles to chase us to our school.”

The Western regional minister, Paul Evans Aidoo, who is the MP of the area, was said to be part of the President’s entourage campaigning in the area.

At the time, authorities of the school were said to have been compelled by circumstances to give the students a number of days to go and take part in the biometric registration exercise in their various towns so that they would not be disenfranchised.

“So they think all of us in the school are NPP,” she noted.