Bawumia's driver has no licence

Details picked up by The Herald suggest that the driver of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Vice-Presidential candidate, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, is not a qualified driver hence the decision of the party to hide the car, under the guise of carrying out its own forensic investigations into the near-fatal accident, instead of the Police Motor Traffic and Transport Unit (MTTU).

Mr. Emmanuel Nana Yaw Mensah alias “School Bus”, is said to have started driving Dr. Bawumia in 2008, following his selection by Nana Akufo-Addo as his running mate in that election, and has since been part of the Bawumia household, playing a second fiddle to a more experienced driver, who the ex-Deputy Governor plucked from the Bank of Ghana.

According to his close associates, the accident driver only does town rides with saloon cars but not long journeys with four-wheel vehicles as happened last Sunday, The Herald gathered. This paper further gathered that Nana Yaw holds License B to drive only saloon cars instead of License C, which is required of him to drive V8 Toyota Land Cruiser vehicles weighing over 3,500 to 5,500 kilogrammes.

Mr. Mensah's License B meant for saloon cars, is suspected to have expired long ago and had not been renewed before proceeding on the near-fatal trip to Bolewura’s final funeral rites last Sunday, in the Northern Region.

Additional findings by The Herald have revealed that neither Dr. Bawumia nor any of the occupants in the car, can claim insurance on the accident; the vehicle also cannot be replaced by the insurance company that has insured it.

The four, according to the Road Traffic Regulations of 2012 LI 2180, require a police report which in the case of this particular accident should have been given by the Northern Regional Branch of the MTTU, which has discovered that the driver has no License to drive.

Section 161(1) requires that “a person may have to apply in writing to the police officer in charge of the jurisdiction within which an accident involving a motor vehicle occurs for a Police Accident Report in relation to the accident”, but as it is now the car cannot be replaced and the occupants cannot also get back the money spent at the hospital for treatment, following the NPP’s decision to tow the mangled car for private forensic investigations.

The Herald’s behind the scene investigations into what led to the NPP General Secretary’s Rwanda-like genocidal comment had earlier revealed that the ambulance was a Good Samaritan’s gesture from the National Security Coordinator, Larry Gbevlo-Lartey, and not a grand plot hatched by President John Mahama with his “Spy Chiefs” to kill Dr. Bawumia.

This paper gathered that the National Security Coordinator ordered one of his transport officers to dispatch two of the ambulances to the airport for Dr. Bawumia and his injured aides involved in the near-fatal accident to be taken to hospital. This was accordingly obeyed, with Dr. Bawumia requesting that he be sent to Lister Hospital at Airport Hills near Teshie-Accra.

Again, the said ex-WO Vincent Kwami Tetteh, who the NPP General Secretary suggested was to kill Dr. Bawumia, was not at the airport when Dr. Bawumia arrived in an aircraft. He had closed and gone home shortly after taking part in seeing off the ex-Brazilian President, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, and later the Lebanese President, Michel Sleiman.

Ex-WO Tettey, is a Deputy Security Coordinator at the Kotoka International Airport (KIA). He is a senior brother to onetime bodyguard to ex-President Jerry John Rawlings, the late RSM Andreas Kofi Tettey. He was at the KIA before the Kufuor administration. He was later sacked by the NPP, and brought back when President Mills came to office.

The Herald gathered that Lt. Col. Gbevlo-Lartey was at KIA, and had heard about Dr. Bawumia being airlifted to Accra following his accident. The National Security Coordinator’s instruction to his transport officer was that Dr. Bawumia and his injured aides were to be driven straight to 37 Military Hospital in Accra, for medical attention.

However, Dr. Bawumia, while comfortably seated in the ambulance, demanded to be taken to the Lister Hospital, a private health facility, which was done with the ambulance returning to the Blue Gate-Castle Annex Osu behind the Accra Sports Stadium.

Dr. Bawumia’s demand that he be taken to the Lister Hospital but not 37 Military Hospital, was relayed to the National Security Coordinator, who did not raise any objection to Dr. Bawumia’s choice of where to be treated.

The Herald has additionally learnt that out of the two ambulances, it was only one which was used by Dr. Bawumia. He is said to have been driven to the Lister Hospital, with his bodyguard and a light-skinned lady, while the other ambulance which was driven by one WO Norgbe, returned to the National Security Secretariat.

Dr. Bawumia left Bole in the Northern Region for the Ashanti Region when the front tires of the vehicle he was travelling on exploded 15 minutes into the journey resulting in the accident as the vehicle somersaulted and veered off the road, rolling over a few times. The NPP leader sustained minor injuries but was treated and discharged by doctors at the Lister Hospital in Accra.

Meanwhile, additional details filtering in suggest that Dr. Bawumia, who was in the car with his press aide, a bodyguard and a driver, was speeding. They had incredibly, according to the NPP General Secretary, used 15 minutes to cover a distance of 89.1 kilometers which should have taken him over one hour to traverse, from Bole in Northern Region to Banda Nkwata.

Meanwhile, vehicle experts have also questioned how two tires could blast off at the same time as claimed by NPP General Secretary, Kwadwo Owusu-Afriyie, alias Sir John, saying it is “impossible”.

To them, the wild allegation by the NPP General Secretary calls into question the safety of the brand of that Toyota vehicle as two tires could blast off at the same time, and that a thorough investigations by both the police and official at the Driver Vehicle and Licensing Authority (DVLA) could lay the controversy to rest.

The Northern Regional MTTU Commander, Supt George Blewushi in an interview with Citi News lamented that the action of the NPP stalwart defied “normal legal procedure.”

He said, “What I know is that if there is an accident at a place, the vehicle should be sent to the nearest police station. If the car does not get to the police station, how would they get an accident report to get claims?” He indicated that “if somebody is saying he doesn’t trust the Police then I don’t know the educational level of that person.”

The Northern Regional Police Command, also through its Public Relations Officer (PRO), ASP Ebenezer Tetteh that although the police did not examine the vehicles at the accident scenes, there was the need for them to pass on their findings to the DVLA for further investigations.