Tribal Balance: Why Utuka Was Killed

A retired Air force Officer, Colonel Kofi Abaka Jackson has said General Utuka, an Ewe was executed by members of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) to satisfy the other ethnic groups whose members in the military were being executed in 1979.

Appearing before the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) yesterday, Col. Jackson who is the author of the book, "When Gun Rules...A testimony of a soldier" said, before General Acheampong, an Ashanti was executed the AFRC members decided to execute him alongside Gen. Utuka to ensure ethnic balance.

"When they decided to execute Gen. Acheampong, the impression was created that the thing was becoming ethnic bias and therefore it looked like one ethnic group is going after the other. So for tribal balance they took general. Utuka alongside."

Col. Jackson who was then in [prison with the Generals at Nsawam Prison said, the Generals after interrogations in Accra were subsequently executed. The Generals were Generals Akuffo, Afrifa, Boakye and Amedume.

Col. Jackson who was a Commissioner for Works and Housing during the Acheampong regime said he was arrested after the 1979 uprising by the junior officers. He said before they were brought to the prison the other ranks shaved them and molested them at the Airforce Barracks. He said at that time the chain of command had deteriorated to the extent that the other ranks shaved Air Marshal Boakye and left "a little hair on his head. They teased him that it was the symbol of his rank."

He said at the prisons their situation was equivalent to animals.

"Life in prison is really terrible. When you are there you have to assume that you are an animal. We ate light porridge in the mornings without salt or sugar as breakfast. In the afternoons, we ate garri which looks like porridge, saw-dust and sometimes it's white but with green lumps. It was really terrible. The cassava was nothing to write home about. In between we had what they call soup but it was some hot water with some rainbow oil on it."

He said some years later from Nsawam Prison he was brought to Arakan Barracks at Burma Camp for interrogation. He said during interrogation he was accused of evacuating an Officer's wife when he was Commissioner for Housing and borrowing a forklift and puller from the Air Force Base for his personal use. He said while the interrogation was going on the other ranks behind him started slapping him.

"Capt. Okaikoi who was one of the interrogators came to sit on the table in front of me and put his legs in between my thighs. He started punching holes with a big needle in my chest. He took his pistol and hit my head with it."

He said he was arraigned before the People's Court at the Peduase Lodge where he could not see his interrogators. He said the room was lined with soldiers but he could hear those questioning him from the ceiling.

"The only person I could see was Pilot Officer Odoi who sat in front of me. He said I am being tried on AFRC Decree 3C which incriminates all officers in the previous government for abusing public office for their personal gains. Within three minutes the trial was over and I was sentenced to sixty years in prison."

He said other army officers who appeared before the court were given between fifty to one hundred and five years jail sentence. He said his assets were confiscated. He said his four and a half years in jail affected his health and the education of his children.

Col. Jackson prayed the commission for a proper retirement and benefits and a deconfiscation of his assets. He said, "I am 25% Ghanaian because I have a Ghanaian Passport and 75% stateless because the constitution does not protect me and discriminates against me. The nation has taken away my past, present and future."

Col. Jackson who is currently an Energy Convention Technologies Research Scientist said he has great things to offer the country. For instance, he told the commission he has invented an equipment that could run vehicles without fuel and a marine and aircraft propeller.

Another witness, Alfred Adjetey Tetteh said his brother, Harrison Tetteh was killed by a stray bullet from a gun of a militia man who was fighting over rotten fish at the Tema Harbour. He said the militia which was headed by WO Yaw Nkwantabisa never compensated them, nor did the state.

Hearing continues next week Tuesday.