Who attempted pocketing $1.9m Police Cash?

Tension had been mounting steadily in the Ghana Police Service over the delay in the payment of Police personnel, who risked their lives to serve in the Sudan on the African Union (AU) Peace-keeping Mission.

The Sun’s AU sources say, when the fuming Police personnel were due to come home last year, their salaries were not ready. Instead, only a part was readied for collection.

Following the development, one senior officer by name ACP Onwona Agyeman was left behind to sort it out, and bring the remaining amount to the rest of the personnel numbering some 360.

THE SUN gathered that, the outstanding amount of as much as $1,944,000 million whose breakdown of $5,400 for each personnel, looked to be outstanding. The expectation of getting their monies over in their pockets rose to a crescendo whetting their appetites for so long, until ACP Agyeman arrived some weeks ago.

The ACP had largely been expected to have in his possession the good news, that the payment had been effected through Ghana’s Mission in Ethiopia. Instead, a blackout cropped up.

However the patience of the personnel was to be stretched taut, when the Police Administration kept mute over the news of the monies’ arrival.

Despite months of persistent checks by the personnel, nothing pretty concrete was told them, and so they were still owed the colossal sum of $5,400 per each personnel of 360 Police men.

But good things are supposed to come to those with the patience to wait, and so after months of waiting, directives from up above were issued last week for the payment of the personnel. That should have settled the matter once and for all, and left it for dead.

Treachery and maliciousness were to dovetail into the matter, when the some of the 360 personnel detected to their utter disappointment that, wrongful reduction had been applied with religious zeal on their pay slips.

THE SUN learnt that the situation created red-hot tension among the personnel, who showed up to collect their cheques only last Tuesday. They discovered to their utter shock that, the Police Administration had wrongfully raked almost $200 from each member’s salary, which they explained to be the cost of uniform.

THE SUN has been hinted that the Police Administration never supplied a part of the personnel any uniforms throughout their stay in Sudan. When tension mounted to the nostrils of hell, the case was reported to the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Patrick Kwarteng Acheampong, who quickly intervened and directed them to withhold the payment.

One account THE SUN is yet to verify, has revealed that, the problem has been rectified.

All efforts by THE SUN to speak to Police authorities over the issue, has hit a 500-ton pillar.

However the question as to who the hell had wanted to fleece the affected Police personnel of their hard-earned cash, earned from the sweat of their brow and the substance of their spine still hangs?

No Officer could brave the odds to comment on the issue, as they kept directing THE SUN to DSP Kwasi Fori, who was also not available at the time the paper called at the office, in the process of going to bed.

Almost around the time of THE SUN’S visit to the Police Headquarters, other members who were not affected were busy collecting their checks from the cafeteria, dancing, while making visible signs of dots of the Christian’s cross on their heads, shoulders and chests.