Paralysed man tells his story to NRC

With a paralysed arm resting on a wobbling right leg, Alfred Amassah Neeequaye of Teshie on Wednesday limped to the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) in Accra to tell his story of a gun shot in the head that has left him paralysed since 1987.

Speaking Ga through an interpreter, Neequaye interrupted his story with brief moments of stillness, and had to be prompted by some of the Commissioners before he continued with his narration.

Amid a dead silent hall, Neequaye told the Commission of how he was fired in the head in the evening of April 4, 1987 by a typist who doubles as a security and counter intelligence agent. This was during a scuffle between the agent and the girlfriend at the La Scala Cinema at Teshie in Accra where the Sappers Band came to stage a performance.

He said he was selling drinks in the hall and when he came out during the break, he saw two ladies one of whom asked him to sell her a bottle of beer. He replied that the drinks were sold only in the cinema hall, and asked them to come in to get the drinks.

"In the course of the conversation with one Sammy and the girls, Jonas Nii Tetteh Mante, alias Akatapore, slapped one of the girls called Philomena Mensah. I asked him why he was beating the girl, but he asked me if I knew the girls, and I also asked him the same question.

"As the conversation continued, Sammy suddenly warned me that Mante was taking a gun. I turned round to look at him, but Mante fired his gun and it hit my head. I fell down unconscious and was rushed to the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital.

He said at the Hospital, the doctor on duty, one Dr Neequaye rather said he was an armed robber who had been shot. However, upon explanation from one Sowah, who was among the people that took him to the hospital, the doctor attended to him.

He said after some drugs were given to him he went into coma for six weeks. He said one Dr Mustapha performed surgery on him to remove the bullet that hit his forehead. "I was on admission for nine months. I had a normal right arm and leg before the shooting. The gunshot affected my right arm and leg.

It weakened them," Neequaye said. He said he had not been able to do any work since this incident. Commission: Did you apply for compensation to the Attorney-Generals Department? Neequaye: No. Commission: So you have not been paid any compensation by anybody? Neequaye: No.

When Tetteh Mante, the alleged perpetrator, was asked to cross-examine Neequaye, he asked him if he could tell the Commission where he bought the rinks. Neequaye replied that he saw him going into a drinking bar, but he did not know if he bought drinks.

Mante told Neeequaye: "I did not go to any drinking bar. You also said I slapped Philomena, but I never slapped her." At this point Mante told the Commission that he would not ask any more question to waste the time of the Commission, but would rest his case and speak only when invited to give evidence.

Continuing his story, Neequaye told the Commission that several drugs were prescribed for him after he was discharged from the hospital, but he did not have money to buy them. His brother staying abroad had to be buying the drugs for him.

He said in 1995 his mother had a letter from Nii Adjei Boye-Sekan, the then

Member of Parliament for Ledzokuku, that he (Neequaye) would be given a 500,000 cedis compensation. Neequaye said his mother made a formal complaint in December 1995 to the Attorney- General's (A-G) Department and the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice. They received a reply from the A-G and the Commission, asking for the medical report on his surgery from Dr Mustapha.

He said after initial failure to get the report from Dr Mustapha, he finally had a medical report from the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, but he has not received any compensation from any quarters on his handicap.

The Commission informed the house that the report indicated brain injury due to gunshots. Mante, who said he is a Muslim, told the Commission that he was then engaged to marry Philomena.

He said he told her that he was going on a refresher course at Asutuare, but returned the same day only to find her fianc?e, with whom he used to stay in Dr Busia's House at Odorkor among a group of people at La Scala Cinema Hall with her back towards him.

He said in his bid to get Philomena from among the people, Neequaye without any provocation hit him and a scuffle ensued. He said the pistol he was having on him went off and grazed Neequaye's forehead, but never went through his head as he was claiming.

"If the bullet had gone through his head, he would not be alive by now," Mante, alias Akatapore and Abdul Aziz, said. Mante who said he was a former Personal Security Commando, who was recruited in 1985 as a typist with additional security duties at the Castle, said after the incident, he fled without attending to his victim when he saw the crowd rushing on him.

He went to make a report to the Counter Intelligence Unit at the Osu Castle, which issued the pistol to him. Mante said at the Castle he was kept in the guardroom. While there he was informed that personnel from the Police Headquarters had come to enquire about the incident.

He said he was charged in 1988 at a magistrate court with attempted murder and was asked to compensate the victim with 500,000 cedis, in addition to 10 years imprisonment or in lieu go to jail for life.

Mante said he decided to go to jail for the 10 years and after spending over six years in jail he decided to pay the compensation. However, his approach, through friends and relations to pay the compensation was rejected by Neequaye's family.

He said he lost an appeal he filed at the Appeal Tribunal a year after his conviction and he was released in October 1995 after the Prisons Headquarters said he had paid the compensation. Mante, now unemployed, promised to assist Neequaye financially when he secures a gainful employment.

Sitting continues.