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Opinions of Friday, 10 June 2016

Columnist: Dabbousi, Fabi

Allotey Jacobs was hauled off BA in an 'Ayele Ametefe' style

Allotey Jacobs Allotey Jacobs

British Airways flight 078 rolled for takeoff RWY 21 outbound to Heathrow from Kotoka International Airport on that fateful night of the 28th of May, 2016.

It seemed to be a regular flight to London Heathrow, and so it was. On board was our good ol' Allotey Jacobs loaded with, eem, err...Jon Benjamin, the British High Commissioner would be in a better position to disclose this info!

Unfortunately for Allotey, behind him was someone who took note of his demeanour and could not resist the urge to wonder why the British police hauled him off the airplane with instructions to leave all his belongings on board.

The worst part was that he was told to follow them for interrogation on suspicion of money laundering, according to the anonymous source.

Jon Benjamin, The British High Commissioner, jumped out of the blues to debunk the story with such vehemence as to insinuate that Allotey Jacobs was his partner, best friend, or family member. In fact, so aggressive was his reaction that he demanded apologies from Ghanaian national activists which he got.

Then the story went into hibernation, knowing that any scandal that the NDC sought to hide in the past was soon exposed. Like a religious prophesy, lo and behold, Namoale, an NDC activist, spoke to this issue. Although he tried to debunk the criminality that Allotey Jacobs was suspected of, albeit foolishly, the undertones suggested otherwise.

This is an excerpt of his submission: “So Allotey upon reaching Heathrow and was questioned by the security personnel on duty, a member of the NPP who was present realizing that he’s been left to go through the checkpoint while Allotey was held up, he waited at the arrival section and watched as all the passengers on the BA flight from Ghana walked off.

After three hours of not seeing any sign of Allotey, he concluded that he had been arrested, but it wasn’t an arrest he was asked harmless questions and was allowed to go later. He went off to America. The NPP man thought Allotey was coming to the UK and so hours after not seeing him there, he concluded that he’d been arrested not knowing that he’d gone to the USA.”

The truth of the matter is that the Embassy of Ghana and others pulled strings at the oddest places. It would seem to me that corruption is also in the system of the Brits who, ironically, called for the anti-corruption summit, recently.

We demand an immediate disclosure of the reasons that premised the arrest of Allotey Jacobs. And for all those who may say that the use of "Arrest" is inappropriate, I wish to remind them that the word means among other things, "the act of depriving people off their liberty, usually in relation to an investigation or prevention of a crime.

It is the disruption of a person from continuing a chore, or their removal from a normal condition to an abnormal one."

Mr Jon Benjamin, I dare say that you lied in favour of Allotey Jacobs, and if the British authorities truly denied the arrest, then I safely feel at liberty to say that they lied, too. You need to apologise to Hopeson Adorye, Maxwell Jumah, and all those who raised the red flag in this matter that you dyed to green.