AMA Guards In Bloody Attack Posted on April 21, 2011

The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) taskforce known as the Rapid Response Unit (RRU) went on rampage on Tuesday when they allegedly ripped off a trader’s ear with a pair of boots at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle area.

The trader, 35-year-old Ebenezer Obeng, had a bitter encounter with a number of the taskforce members on the evening of Tuesday, which virtually left his right ear torn off.

Ebenezer, who happens to be a shoe seller, narrated his ordeal to Peace FM and said about 9pm on Tuesday, he was hawking in front of the Allied Filling station at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle when a group of AMA staff accosted him with his products.

He claimed they accused him of flouting the AMA by-law that prohibits selling on the streets and pavements in the city.

Ebenezer said they tried to seize his goods which he had by then exhibited in front of a locked shop and for that matter was not ready to release it to them since he was not selling on either the street or the pavement.

This, according to him, led to heated exchanges between him and the AMA men who were bent on seizing his goods.

As matters got worse, the trader narrated, the AMA staff decided to take him to their boss at the nearby Holy Gardens.

When they got to the supposed boss and he was being interrogated, he indicated that the enraged members of the taskforce pounced on him amidst hefty slaps, because they claimed he had lied to their boss, after which the boss ordered his men to burn his merchandise, which they did in his presence.

According to him, they later handed him over to some of their colleagues who, numbering about 15, subjected him to some severe beatings.

“While I was held down, one of the members of the AMA taskforce team stamped on my ears with his heavy boots…leading to my right ear nearly being ripped off…They told me I can take it to wherever I want.”

It is not clear whether he has since lodged a formal complaint with the police.

Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the AMA, Numo Blafo III, has confirmed the incident but denied the trader’s claim that his ear was severed with a pair of boots.

He told DAILY GUIDE it was a gate that split Ebenezer’s ear when he was struggling with members of the taskforce and not the result of a stamp from a boot as he alleged.

That notwithstanding, he said, the staff involved, whose name he refused to disclose, has admitted to the incident and has since been summoned for interrogation, after which he would be sanctioned appropriately.

It has however emerged that the RRU members are virtually half-baked since, according to Numo Blafo, “you know it was an emergency so they were given some training and we are trying to make sure that after some time, upon the way they behave then we will send them to the Police Training Depot at Tesano so that they will be absorbed into the metro guards.”

Asked how long the supposed training lasted, he said, “Oh about a month or two.”

It is not clear what criteria were used in their selection process.

Some believe they are a bunch of foot-soldiers of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) who have been clothed and sent to the streets to earn a living.

By Charles Takyi-Boadu