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Opinions of Monday, 1 December 2014

Columnist: CENAB UK

Rejoinder to The Enquirer

The headline story carried in the 28th November edition of The Enquirer “Another Ghanaian Arrested At Heathrow” is a complete hoax, CENAB UK can confirm.

The story which purports to state that “a team of UK police armed with guns and law enforcement paraphernalia yesterday morning stormed a British Airways flight at Terminal 5 Tarmac and whisked away a Ghanaian from the aircraft,” is intended to divert attention from the ongoing Nayele Ametefeh’s drug case and focus on the fact that the issue of drug trafficking is a common occurrence in Ghana.

The aim of the story carried by The Enquirer is to create an impression that there was collaboration between NACOB and their British counterpart. As the story purports “the flight arrived in Heathrow around 5:30 am but passengers were asked to stay on board until the police walked straight to his seat and whisked him away.” The purpose of this spin from the newspaper is to give an impression of a tip off from Ghana.

Following on from the deception by NACOB of collaboration with UK agencies which was uncovered by the British High Commission as untruth, the NDC and their rent press are desperate to create a new story to show that they have been collaboration.

This story was so unprofessionally done in terms of details or substance and style. It does not state how the gentleman believed to be in his 30s and carrying a Ghana Must Go bag managed to avoid the Ghanaian authorities but who then managed to alert UK officials of his arrival. Did he also use the VVIP? Was he also aided just like Nayele was to avoid arrest in Ghana?

The Enquirer relies on an eyewitness account which is so unbelievable. The eye witness in Accra attests to the fact that the arrested man boarded the plane in Accra, wearing a Black suit and was the last to board. The same “eyewitness’ accounts suggest that the UK law enforcement agencies had prior knowledge of his arrival in the UK because as soon as they stormed the aircraft, they marched straight to his seat checking the seat numbers until it got to his seat when he was whisked away,” according to the paper. The duality of the location of this eyewitness makes the story very elementary and a knee jerked reaction by their paper to do their masters’ bidding.

CENAB UK is therefore challenging The Enquirer newspaper to come back again with a better story, more professionally done and avoid the spin to cover their paymasters’ tracks. The picture accompanying the story has nothing to do with an airport arrest as it is a library picture which has been carried in UK from a previous edition of UK newspaper Daily Mail.

CENAB UK wishes to appeal to all media in Ghana to feed the public with its fourth estate obligation of education and information. Stories like this denigrate the value of the press and put some of them into the realm of dirty partisan politics.

Source: CENAB UK

cenabuk@gmail.com