Okorase Residents Clash With Police … Over Missing Colleague

From Isaac Akwetey-Okunor, Okorase
([email protected])
Residents of Okorase in the Akuapim North District of the Eastern Region on Monday went on rampage and set ablaze a car belonging to local fetish priest and also vandalized properties running into thousands of Ghana cedis, after mysterious disappearance of a member of the community.

The action of the irate residents particularly the youth came as a result of what they described as feet dragging by the police of the area to launch investigations into the disappearance of their friend, Kojo Yeboah, 35. The residents suspect a fetish priest whose name was not readily available at the time of filing report to be behind the sudden disappearance of the 35 year old carpenter; hence the police must move in to arrest the former.

They, however, on Monday, decided to take the law into their own hands by attacking the fetish priest but the police move in swiftly to keep the priest in custody to protect him from any harm from the charged youth. But this act of the police did not go down well with the residents, who later poured their anger on the police demanding for immediate release of the priest, forcing the police to fire several warning shots.

The residents did not understand why the Police were protecting the priest, burnt a car belonging to the priest, which had been parked in front of the Police Station, causing traffic on the road. In an interview with a family member, the paper was told that: Yeboah left home three weeks ago in the company of two others, including the fetish priest, in search of some special “green bottles” to sell for money.

According to the family, the rest of the team that went in search of the special bottle returned without Yeboah. His cell phone could not also be reached. The family member said they later saw the priest in the town, and quickly reported the matter to the Police, who met with them and the priest after which an agreement was reached for a search team to be dispatched to Apam in the Central Region where the three had gone in search of the bottles.

On Monday, the team comprising Police officers, family members and the priest went to Apam to search for Yeboah but did not find him. They then returned to Okorase. Rituals and other efforts did not help find the body or give a clue or direction to the whereabouts of the missing man.    The Police sensing danger, decided to keep the priest in their custody to avoid him being lynched by the angry residents but that infuriated them the more as they suspected  the Police for shielding him instead of investigating him.