We Want Soldiers – Say Afram Plains Residents

Residents of Donkorkrom, capital of the Afram Plains North District in the Eastern Region, have kicked against the police administration's decision to have them rebuild the area's police station before they would be given police protection.

According to the residents, they don’t need the police in the area again and have asked the government to deploy military men to the area to protect them. They say they don’t trust the police any longer.

The opinion leaders in the area made these known when the Eastern Regional Minister, Mavis Frimpong, visited the district capital on Friday to address the residents on last week's mayhem.

Ms Mavis Frimpong, who went to the Presbyterian Hospital to visit the injured victims and donated cash to the authorities to take care of them before meeting the residents, called on the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to reverse his decision to withdraw all the police personnel in the area until the residents had rebuilt the destroyed station.

“The residents here cannot be without police protection; they need security. I am calling on the IGP to reverse his decision and act on the residents'   request so as to restore peace here,” she posited.

She further appealed to the opinion leaders to talk to the youth so that peace would be restored.

Meanwhile, the wives of the police officers in the area have also appealed to the IGP to transfer their husbands to different places and bring new officers to replace them so as to ensure their safety, since the residents are on warpath with them.

The police administration on Friday said police personnel would not be assigned to Donkorkrom and Tease until a police station that was destroyed by the residents in the course of a demonstration, had been rebuilt.

A colossal number of residents of Donkorkrom and Tease on Thursday   went on rampage and set ablaze a police station, barracks and police vehicles to protest against the escape of two police officers who were arrested for allegedly attempting to rob a GCB Bank bullion van of the money it was carrying.

The attempted robbery led to the death of the driver of the van after a hot exchange of gunfire between the police officer who was escorting the van and the cops, together with their purported civilian accomplice.

The Director of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID), COP Prosper Kwame Agblor, during a press briefing, said when the incident happened, “We came out to assure the general public of the efforts we were making to re-arrest the suspects and urged them to remain calm and assist the police in this direction.”

According to him, the action of the residents that followed the escape of the suspects was unfortunate and reprehensible, adding that on Thursday residents of Donkorkrom and Tease, upon instigation by some opinion leaders, mobilized themselves and attacked some police stations and vandalized the facilities mentioned above.

He noted that some of the residents also “attacked the police officers and their families and looted one of the blocks in the barracks, taking personal belongings of the affected personnel and their families away.”

FROM Daniel Bampoe,  Donkokrom