"WO Adjei Boadi 'sprayed' soldiers" - witness

Ex-Warrant Officer Class One Joseph Kwabena Adjei Boadi, a former member of the erstwhile Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) was on Tuesday mentioned at the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) hearing, to have sprayed bullets and killed five soldiers who were in detention at the Border Guards Headquarters on June 23 1983.

Counsel for Adjei Boadi, Agyare Koi Larbi, however, denied the accusation, saying the five whom, he described as dissidents trying to overthrow the PNDC, died during an exchange of fire between them and troops loyal to the government under the command of Adjei Boadi.

The witness, Fred Gyimah, a farmer resident at Adenta in Accra, was a son of the late Samuel Kofi Gyimah, one of the five, said to have been shot by Adjei Boadi. Fred told the Commission that, his father, a former Military Intelligence Officer, after hearing a radio announcement from the PNDC government for all former military intelligence officers to report, he was consequently detained for three months at the Base Workshop Guardsroom and then transferred to the Nsawam Prisons.

He said on 19 June 1983, after having stayed in Nsawam Prison for more than a year, one Giwa staged a military coup and declared a jailbreak. Fred said his father, Kofi Gyimah, Sgt Atta and three other soldiers fled to Dormaa Ahenkro where they slept in Sgt Atta's house to continue their flight into exile in Cote d'Ivoire the next day.

The following day, they were refused entry into Cote d'Ivoire at the border and they were arrested and sent back to the Border Guard Headquarters, and detained in the guardroom.

Shortly, his mother heard the repatriation of Kofi and his colleagues and she sent them food on 21 June1983. Just as the woman had left and the detainees were having their meals, Adjei Boadi arrived, asked of the people brought from Dormaa Ahenkro, why they were fleeing, and sprayed the bullets on them and killed them, Fred said the gateman told his mother who in turn told him.

According to Fred, his mother who died eight years later, upon hearing of the tragedy of his father went to the Border Guard Headquarters and saw a pool of blood at where his father and others were supposed to have been shot dead.

He said the Officer Commanding the Achiase Jungle Warfare gave instructions to his grandparents, who were staying at Achiase not to organize any funeral for their son. Fred stated that after almost 20 years, the family was yet to organise a funeral for his father. He demanded to know where the Military had kept the body since then.

He attributed his mother's death to excessive thinking after the father's death, adding that since the death of his mother, he had to take care of his five siblings with great difficulty. Their education, as well as learning a trade was a problem for him.

Fred indicated the plight of the family had been a guarded secret for almost the 20 years and said he had only voiced it out because of the establishment of the Commission. Members of the Commission unanimously expressed their sympathy to him and his siblings over the loss of both parents.

Gilbert Victor Kudjo Baku, formerly of the Ghana National Fire Service (GNFS), complained of torture and wrongful dismissal from the service and denied his benefits from January 1981. Baku of Leklebi Dafor in the Volta Region said he was dismissed after being framed up of having misappropriated funds.

John Jacob Atagba of Anloga, a former cigarette distributor, prayed the Commission for the return of his vehicle that was seized after being framed up for not paying his income and other taxes.