Bomb scare hits hotel

BEARLY ONE month to the celebration of the Golden Jubilee anniversary of the country, The Chronicle has uncovered an emerging ‘terrorist’ threat that may scare away various dignitaries and tourists from patronizing Ghanaian hotels during their visit.

The criminal group has notified hotel owners and managers via the Internet about the alleged planting of bombs in their hotels.

The latest of such bomb scares captured by The Chronicle intelligence was an e-mail message notifying Dutchotel Nshona, a 3-star hotel located at the beaches of Nungua, a suburb of the nation’s capital, Accra of the planting of a bomb at the premises of the hotel.

The senders of the mail, dated January 16, 2007, as indicated on a copy of the mailed message captured by Chronicle’s web intelligence experts, gives the senders address as “noname namewayoutster1@gmail.com,” and gives the subject as, “ITS FOR YOUR OWN GOOD.”

The sender(s) of the message demanded from the management of the hotel, a ransom of $500,000, which should be paid for the disconnection of the bombs.

It partly reads, “This is the only way I could reach you people, no matter who you are, make sure this gets to your manager (MD), if not you have yourself to blame for your ignorance. A bomb has been planted in your Hotel till the date it will be activated, which is best known to our employer. If you are ready to negotiate with me, I will disconnect it. I know what am about to do is a betrayal to my group, I can disconnect the bomb and take it away.”

“I need the sum of $500,000 USD equivalent, $250,000 will be paid to an account I will provide for you and the balance will be paid after the disconnection. I will need three men to help me out during the disconnection and you will provide those men.

If you agree with me, get back to me, if not don’t even think of contacting me.” “Finally, don’t involve the corps/police on this, because if you do, I stand the risk, but you stand the worst risk, non of your apology will be accepted to me if you do. Remember, I took risk for sending you this information or lets put it this way, am a betrayal to my team. If we have a deal, get back to me, this will last for five days only.”

The Chronicle has gathered that the security apparatus of the nation has been alerted about the dangerous threats and have started investigations into the matter.

The paper also learnt that personnel from the Ghana Armed Forces were detailed to the Dutchotel recently upon having information about the threat. Colonel E. K. Nibo, Director of Public Relations of the Ghana Armed Forces, confirmed to the paper in an interview yesterday that an Explosive device team had gone to the hotel for investigations.

Colonel Nibo, however, disclosed that the Military personnel who were detailed to the Hotel for inspection, could not do a proper inspection at the premises because management of the hotel did not allow the personnel to carry out the necessary inspection with the reason that their presence, was likely to scare their clients as well as drive away potential ones.

Asked whether the management of the hotel had that right to prevent the security personnel from executing the security-related duty, the Public Relations Director said, “well that is their property, so if they say you won’t enter, what are you going to do? Do you jump the wall?”

A source close to the Management of the Hotel, told the paper that they did not prevent the military personnel from entering the facility for the inspection but only pleaded with them to come to the hotel in civilian cloths, after they had arrived in uniform, which the personnel agreed to but went and never returned.

A senior officer of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) disclosed to The Chronicle that officers from the military and his outfit had visited the Hotel for their preliminary investigations and stated that if the need arose for them to go back to the Hotel they would do so.

The BNI officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, disclosed to The Chronicle that Mr. Van Staalduinen, a Dutch national living in Ghana and his wife Kaye, who are connected to a litigation over the ownership of the hotel were invited for questioning on the bomb scare due to their connections to the hotel.

He stated further that, Mr. Van Staalduinen was embroiled in litigation over the ownership of the Hotel with one Arthur Paes. He said the Dutchman denied knowledge of any issue connected to an alleged planting of a bomb at the hotel.