Rawlings kept low profile because he was mobbed anytime he stepped out - Afotey Agbo

A former Greater Accra regional minister, and now Regent for Katamanso, Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo has described in plain terms, how popular the late former president, Jerry John Rawlings, was even in the 1970s.

He said that after his arrest by the Limann government, Rawlings sought redress from the court but was told that if the government felt threatened by his movements and decided to put surveillance on him, then it had every right to do so.

This concern, he added, disturbed the former president who decided that if the courts would not give him a fair hearing, then it was better to keep a low profile.

He said that in his attempt to do this, the late statesman's popularity grew even more.

“This was somebody who, when he even stepped out to go buy milk, or something in a shop, within few minutes, the place will become like a rally ground because people loved and supported him,” he said.

He made this known in an interview on Citi TV, monitored by GhanaWeb, where he described, among other issues, circumstances that led to President Rawlings' arrest at Katamanso and how it affected the lives of the people in the community.

"He was always mobbed when he stepped out and with even all that, he was still being chased until two years later. He stopped coming to Katamanso after the day he was arrested because we were also being tormented. He said that if it is because of him, we would be going through all these things then he would stop coming," he narrated in the interview monitored by GhanaWeb.

He added that since that period, the next time they heard of him was on December 31, 1981, when he showed up again in what was another successful coup.

Jerry John Rawlings died at the age of 73 at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, on November 12, 2020, after a short illness.

He has since been buried at the new Military Cemetary in Accra.