Agona Swedru (Central Region)Parents of teenage girls implicated in the Agona Swedru Internet sex scandal have appealed to the Minister for Women Affairs to take a personal interest in the affair which is destroying the lives of future women within the Agona Swedru township and its environs.
The appeal has come in the wake of the arrest of one member of the foreign syndicate of Internet sex trade Mogens Riber in Norway and the Norwegian government’s determination to get other members arrested and prosecuted for what it termed as the syndicate members taking advantage of the poverty situation in developing countries to abuse unsuspecting persons to enrich themselves.
The parents were amazed by the fact that the Norwegian government had gone a step further to send an investigative team to identify victims for compensation to be paid to them. They said they were very happy with the Norwegian government’s not so much for the compensation or the monetary gain that it entailed but the concern shown.
According to the parents the Internet sex scandal affair was uncovered over six years ago when pictures of young women from Swedru between the ages of 18 to 25 years appeared on some website and brought untold suffering to the family of these women and also caused the break down of the marriages of some of the women.
They said that the matter thereafter became a subject of police Investigation out of which nothing productive emerged but further suffering and money extortion from family members by the police.
The parents said the few local male syndicate members who lured the young women into this business were arrested but were left off the hook after a few days and came back only to introduce more sophistication into their operation.
What, according to the parents, worry them most is that the syndicate members have recently changed their method of using matured women and have resorted to taking nude pictures of girls between the ages of 12 and 14 years.
The parents of Juliana Efe Paintsil for instance narrated how their daughter who, in 1999 was in JSS 1 and barely 13 years was introduced to Mogens Riber and consequently left home to live with Mogens and has never come back to her parents again. She is now 16 years with a fatherless child and living in Accra on her own.
What the parents could understand was the fact that the operation of the local syndicate members are in the full glare of the Swedru Police and nothing happens to them.
Two of the policemen, who wanted to remain anonymous when contacted, said the matter had come under investigation several times but each time a senior police officer of the rank of Commissioner in Accra stood between them and nailing the culprit.
They cited two instances the Commissioner openly demonstrated his interest in protecting the culprits and even went to the extent of trying to cause trouble for Chief Inspector Boye who was leading the team of investigators. Chief Inspector Boye who is now Assistant Commissioner of Police on Peacekeeping Mission in Bosnia suffered a lot of torture at the hands of this Commissioner whose identity I am compelled to put on the hold for the time being.
According to these two policemen Mogens Riber who now is the subject of Interpol investigation was first arrested in Swedru in a case involving nude pictures taking and other complaints related to his affair with Julian Efe Paintsil.
They said just when the man was to be put before court the Commissioner through a wireless caused the docket to be transferred to Accra and thereafter the suspect jumped bail.
The Graphic Showbiz went to the Police Headquarters to check this but the top officers were at a meeting which run the whole day. However, DSP Frank Kwofie of Interpol Office of the CID headquarters said in response to the paper’s questions that even though the local syndicate component of the Internet scandal was interesting and they may visit it in the near future, they wre at the moment pre-occupied with assisting the Norwegian Interpol Police which is about to wind up its investigations into the Mogens Riber case.
