NRC records emotional day as witnesses sob

Open tears, sobs and wailing, accompanied by anger marked proceedings at the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) on Wednesday as one witness after another narrated their ordeals in the aftermath of the 4 June 1979 military Uprising and Halidu Giwa's abortive coup in June 1983.

Madam Sikiratu Dogbe Ajane, who brought with her a briefcase full of papers and documents with yet another sack of documents, sobbed most of the time as she re-lived how soldiers stormed her house, arrested her, a son and her husband's nephew, and detained and manhandled them for 11 days at Arakan Barracks in July 1979.

Not only did she later lose her son and her husband's nephew but also her husband's properties, including houses, articulated trucks and buses were seized. Building materials and vehicle accessories were also auctioned but the proceeds were not given to her.

She prayed the Commission for the release of the seized properties, which have since been occupied by operatives of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI); frozen bank account and vehicles.

Madam Sikiratu Ajane said just after she had returned from the bathhouse early in the morning of 23 July 1979, she saw a group of soldiers in front of the gate in their house at Kokomlemle. They ordered her to shut up when she asked them of their mission.

Soon they joined her in the room and asked her of the whereabouts of her husband, the late Alhaji Yussif Ajane. Madam Sikiratu Ajane said when she told them he was sick and had travelled; the soldiers arrested her and threw her into a military vehicle waiting outside. They also fired a shot, which hit the ankle of her last born.

The soldiers arrested one of her sons and a nephew of her husband and sent them to the Arakan Barracks. Madam Sikiratu Ajane said they made her crawl on her knees and was slapped from behind when she asked why she was being maltreated. She bled from her knees, she said.

She added that she was stripped naked after crawling and in the evening she was taken into a room where she met other detainees. Madam Sikiratu Ajane said during the 11 days that she was at the Arakan Barracks; she had no bath. On her return home, Sakiratu Ajane said, the soldiers placed her under house arrest for three weeks. She never went outside the house and no one visited her.

Madam Sikiratu Ajane said the soldiers returned and after asking her not to disclose what had happened to her, they demanded the keys to the room where her husband kept her property. They also went to her husband's workshop and took away his articulated trucks, buses, and building materials.

The soldiers later brought a paper, which they said was a copy of an inventory of the things they had seized, but ordered her to shut up when she asked them where they were sending them.

Madam Sikiratu Ajane said seven Benz buses were seized and three broken down articulated trucks were auctioned. She said the BNI has since 1979 been occupying the buildings that were confiscated.

She said the family wrote to the Assets Confiscation Committee, but she was often asked to exercise patience. Now she lives in a rented home. When Commissioner General Emmanuel Alexander Erskine asked when her husband died, she began sobbing and Dr Araba Sefa Dede, Head of the Counselling Department went to her side to offer comfort.

"I'm sorry I didn't mean to hurt you, but I'm sorry we have to gather some courage so that we can move through the process," General Erskine said. "I want you to be strong. I want you to be proud of him. We will see what we can do, but in the meantime, you have to keep strong," he said.

Muftawu Yussif Ajane, Sikiratu Ajane's son who said he was 15 years old at the time, corroborated the military assault and seizure of the family's property. He said his father was always worried of his huge loss, even on his sick bed before he died in 1992.

He produced documents from which he read that the inventory of seized assets was signed by Warrant Officer Class Two Fred Tabia, Sergeant Korda, Staff Sergeant Babanao and one Asante of the then Ghana National Trading Corporation (GNTC).

Appearing angry and worried at different times of his evidence, Ajane said the soldiers seized their properties in what they called "housecleaning". He said Nyarko from Kumasi and Baah, who, he said, has a workshop adjacent to the Police Depot in Accra were the auctioneers. Adjane said only two of his father's houses had been de-confiscated, but there had not been any letter from the government to that effect. Ajane said the one Jecty and Owusu at the Assets Confiscation Committee intimidated his father on his efforts to recover his assets.