Fear grips Takoradi missing girls’ families as police get ready for DNA test

The discovery of human remains in two separate septic tanks at Kansawrodo and Nkroful, suburbs of Sekondi, has sent shivers down the spine of residents of Sekondi-Takoradi, particularly, families who have reported their missing children.

The discovery has heightened grave fears, particularly, amongst the family of the missing girls as to whether or not the remains could be that of their missing girls.

This has put the families in an emotional ‘trauma’, considering the number of human remains the police operation has uncovered and retrieved from two separate tanks, which matches the exact number of reported missing girls. Priscilla Bentum, 21, Priscilla Mantebea Kuranchie, 18, Ruth Love Quayson, and Ruth Abakah have been declared missing.

The man behind the suspected kidnapping of the four girls, Samuel Udotek Wills, currently in prison, is assisting the police to find the missing girls.

However, many of the leads the suspect had given to the police in tracing the missing girls have ended in a wild goose chase without any fruitful results.

Considering the recent discovery of the human remains in a two separate septic tanks, one close to the house of the suspected kidnapper of the three missing girls, fears of the remains turning out to be that of the girls are high, a situation that has put the families into an emotional trauma.

Udotek Wills, the prime suspect, lived at Kansawrodo in a rented one bedroom.



On August, 2 this year, at about 11 am, plainclothes police personnel started arriving at the house where the suspected kidnapper lived.

The police cordoned off the area as a crime zone. Eye witness say at 3pm the same day, another batch of police personnel arrived, this time round blowing sirens.

At 5pm, the police demanded a cutlass, shovel and pick axe from nearby residents.

This apparently heightened suspicion as to what exactly the police were at the house to do.

But the presence of the suspected kidnapper in the company of the team ‘killed’ their suspicions that the operation may have everything to do with the missing girls. The police then weeded the area where the septic tank was located.

An eyewitness recounts that after the weeding, the slabs were removed and a tanker arrived and started pumping out the human waste in the septic tank.

They then used a bamboo stick with a nail on it to retrieve some suspected human parts. Eyewitnesses say the police put the human remains in two separate boxes and placed in them one of the seven police pick-ups and sped off blowing sirens in the process.

Following the retrieval of the human remains, the police administration issued a press statement announcing the discovery of the human remains near the house of the suspected kidnapper.

The statement further said the police was going to undertake a DNA test to authenticate whether or not the human remains were that of the missing girls.

But the families of the missing girls, emotionally traumatised by the discovery of the human remains, were hopeful the human body parts would not be that of their daughters, because they believe they are still alive.

But residents in Takoradi are worried and grieving over the discovered remains. “From now to the last day the DNA test would be carried out to ascertain whether or not the human remains are that of the reported missing girls, the families would have to live with the reality of hoping, wishing and praying the test turns out negative,” a worried resident told this reporter.

“This is a very difficult situation for the families, and I understand the emotional pain and difficulty they are going through,” a journalist, who did not want to be named, told this reporter. For Kwesi Yankey: “I believe the families are going through a very difficult moment for now and need the support of the whole country.”

But, before the discussions surrounding the police discovery could die down, the law enforcement agency made yet another discovery of human remains.

On the August 6, a team of police forensic experts, which had arrived in Takoradi, found another human remains (skeleton) in another septic tank in an uncompleted building at Nkroful, a suburb of Takoradi.

It must be put on record that the last skeleton found was the area where the suspected kidnapper was rearrested when he broke jail.

The last skeleton found brings to four the number of human remains discovered by the police, which matches the exact number of girls reported kidnapped.

The families of the missing girls initially declined to submit themselves for the DNA test, but following the interventions of well-to-do people in society, they have rescinded their decision.