False Alarm; NPP Gets Ghanaians Arrested Claiming They’re Togolese

Desperate for a smoking gun to justify the siege of the Volta Region by security forces on the orders of President Akufo-Addo, the NPP yesterday raised what turned out to be a false alarm claiming they had intercepted a busload of Togolese who were been brought across the border by the NDC to acquire a voter ID card in the ongoing voter registration exercise taking place throughout the country.

The police were brought in to arrest the occupants of the bus, take them to the police station and lock them up in a cell. At the end of the day, however, it turned out those arrested were all Ghanaians, elderly citizens of the Agortime-Ziope constituency who had been helped with a bus by the MP to go to the registration center to acquire their voter ID cards.

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One of them is even a retired soldier. After serving Ghana in the Army for decades, W.O. Christian Agbeviade (Rtd) is now blind. He stays at Hornugo No.1 in the Agortime Ziope Constituency.  How a man who had served in the Ghana Armed Forces is not a Ghanaians according to the NPP leaves much to be desired. And, he had in his possession his Ghana passport!

Interestingly, after intercepting the bus, NPP executives in the area including their regional chairman quickly shot a video of the mini-bus with the old folks in while running commentary of their claims. The commentator began by saying;

“Ghanaians all over the world wherever you are, the point that we are making in the NPP that the NDC is engaged in bringing in Togolese to register and vote in our elections, this is just another evidence we have here. I am here with my regional chairman, Hon Macafui Kofi Wanya, as you can see him. This is the car GR 3234 M and this is what the driver has been doing. Since we stopped the car he jumped out and ran away.

So this is what we are saying; that the NDC is engaged in the business of bringing in Togolese to come and register and vote in our election. As you can see in my palm, this piece of the paper is the fact that when they bring the people, they write the name of possible places in Ghana. Now we are in Agortime so this is one of the places the person has to mention that he is a resident. So this is what we are saying, the NDC in spite of all the things they are doing, they are engaged in bringing in Togolese”

Residents of the Agortime infuriated by the arrest of their folks stormed the police station demanding their release. Some began to pelt the police station with stones. It took a lot of work by some opinion leaders to calm them down. Hon. Kwame Agbodza, MP for Adaklu and Hon George Loh, the Volta Regional Vice-Chairman later managed to secure bail for those arrested amidst a charged atmosphere.

It was observed that the NPP officials who caused the arrest of the old folks realizing they had goofed big time sneaked away from the police station unnoticed when the residents of the area stormed the place.