We live in fear, remove us from here : Police wives cry out
Wives of policemen at Donkorkrom in the Kwahu Afram Plains North District have appealed to the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to transfer their husbands from the area to ensure their safety.
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Their appeal follows the violent confrontation between the residents and the police in the area over alleged police involvement in a robbery attack on a bullion van which resulted in the death of the driver.
They made the appeal when the Eastern Regional Minister, Ms Mavis Ama Frimpong, visited the area over the weekend.
Our lives are in danger
“We can’t even go to the market any longer since the incident. They have planned to harm us and so we cannot even go about our normal duties. We want to leave this place because our lives are in danger,” one of them said.
Another also said: “We are confused; our lives are in danger. We are appealing to the authorities to send us away from this area.”
The police last Thursday morning shot into a crowd of angry residents of the area when they attempted to attack them.
The rowdy crowd succeeded in vandalising the police station and the barracks.
The feud that ensued resulted in 14 people, including a woman, sustaining gunshot wounds.
The residents indicated that they did not need the presence of the current crop of police personnel at Donkorkrom, "since they conspire with criminals to engage in vicious activities".
Assurance of safety
The minister assured them of maximum security from the state, stating that at least 90 police officers had been deployed to the area to help restore calm and protect lives and properties.
“They are well resourced with ammunition to protect you. You are not the only ones they will protect but the entire community. Relax and feel at home, no one will harm you. Continue supporting your husbands because you are protected,” she said.
Ms Frimpong later visited the wounded at the Presbyterian Hospital and footed the hospital bills for all the victims which totalled GH¢6,000.
Meanwhile the residents, in an interview, revealed to the Daily Graphic that the place was already sitting on a time bomb and that it only needed a trigger to "explode" into mayhem which became possible through the escape of the two suspected robbers at Nkawkaw.
"We have really suffered in the hands of armed robbers all these years. We only hope that this arrest will bring freedom to us here as a people," one of them said.
Connivance with armed robbers
According to them, the robbery was initially done at night but it progressed to broad daylight with impunity.
"What made us suspicious that the police were involved in robberies and were in bed with robbers here was that some robberies were done just a few metres away from their barriers yet they were not interested in going to the rescue of the victims. They are at the barriers only to extort money from drivers but not to protect us.”
“When we heard the two guys had escaped, we lost patience. The guys are known policemen who give us hell of time here. They sometimes dress like Fulani herdsmen to rob passengers," a victim at the hospital said.
Overhaul the police force
They pleaded with the government to do an overhauling of the entire police contingent in the Afram Plains, as well as between Adawso and Kwahu Tafo, and bring a new set of officers.
They, however, rejected the IGP's position of withdrawing all police personnel from the area until the community members have renovated the building they vandalised, and maintained they still needed the services of the police.
They said they needed a new set of personnel, adding that “the authorities should provide the police here with good vehicles and equipment to fight crime”.