Horror at Tema - Man Kills wife and commits suicide
Justice Afreh warns students against criminal activities
Tema Manhean (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - A 35-year old man, Godson Nyador shot and killed his wife at Tema Manhean at dawn on Monday on suspicion of her, having an illicit affair with her former husband.
Nyador, a former storekeeper of a construction company but currently unemployed, also committed suicide by shooting himself in the neck. His body was still lying in a pool of blood in his bed at their single room apartment at Club 24, a suburb of Tema Manhean, when the Ghana News Agency went to the scene at about 11am.
According to one of the co-tenants in the house, Mr Ashie Nii Kwei, they heard Nyador's wife Miss Emelia Dzagah, 25, screaming: "Help! Help! He will kill me! He will kill me!" at about 2:30am
All the co-tenants came out of their rooms and banged Nyador's door for him to open, but he refused until Nii Kwei broke the door open with his foot and Nyador's wife staggered out of the room looking weak and tired from struggles and beatings from her husband.
Nii Kwei said "Nyador then followed, holding a gun and without uttering any words, he pointed the gun at me and signalled me to clear off his path." Nyador then stood in front of his veranda and fired one shot at his wife and the bullet hit his wife in the shoulder and penetrated through to her chest, which sent her sprawling on to the floor, Nii Kwei added.
The incident scared the other tenants and the Landlady, who all scuttled back into their rooms but others came out later to pick Miss Dzagah in a taxi to the Tema General Hospital.
Nyador then went back into his room and shot himself dead. His wife was also pronounced dead soon after arrival at the hospital. "I am scared, I have never seen anything like this before," said Madam Agoe Boye, the 75 year-old Landlady.
The co-tenants said Nyador, who lost his job about a year ago, was a very quiet man, who neither took alcohol nor smoked and was always found reading his Bible quietly on his veranda.
"We are, therefore, even at a loss why he procured a gun, which he brought home about a month ago", said Miss Hannah Lawson. She said three months ago, Nyador accused his wife who was a petty trader of having an affair with her former husband, a driver at Tema Community Four, who was only named as Coffie.
This resulted in a quarrel and the woman packed out from her matrimonial home but returned after their families settled the matter. Miss Lawson said on Sunday night at about 9:00pm when the couple was having their dinner there was another quarrel. But things appeared to have cooled down and they all retired to bed.
The Tema Police, which is investigating the case have gone for the gun and taken some pictures from the couple's room and are expected to remove the body later in the day.
Many people, both men and women have condemned the rising practice of men shooting their wives. They referred to the recent incident where a Takoradi based Tanker owner shot dead his wife over a conversation she had on mobile phone.
A 47 year-old man also shot and killed his wife and sister in-law in Accra after accusing his wife of infidelity but he failed in an attempt to commit suicide. At Poase-Cement in the Kedjebi District of the Volta Region, a 60-year old "akpeteshie" distiller shot his wife dead in an argument over a rat meat and later committed suicide.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - Justice Kwame Afreh, a Judge of the Court of Appeal on Saturday warned students who indulge in criminal activities not to believe that they were exempted from the general laws of the country.
"Every person of or above 12 years of age is fully liable for his or her criminal acts. If he is below 17 he may be tried in a juvenile court but that does not exempt an offender from Criminal Liability," Justice Afreh noted when he addressed the Achimota school's 75th Founders' Day celebration to remember the founding fathers of the school that worked tirelessly to achieve a high standard of education.
These founders were Sir Gordon Guggisburg a Governor of the Gold Coast, Reverend Alexander Frasser a Missionary, and Dr. Kwagyir Aggrey a Ghanaian educationist. The occasion, which saw the rich cultural display of the various ethnic groups, was on the theme "Achimota and Nation Building."
Justice Afreh also an old student of the 1952-year group said the epidemic of lawlessness had infected educational institutions, especially second cycle schools, adding "These things are happening because people think they can do them with impunity.
He said these days, students do not just petition, protest or demonstrate but go on rampage, destroy property and cause mayhem. Justice Afreh said there were worrying reports of students' involvement in robbery, stealing, use of narcotic drugs, drinking and combat over girls among other things adding that the conviction for any offence could have tragic and serious consequences.
"Robbery is punishable by life imprisonment, smoking or possession of narcotic drugs by a minimum of 10 years imprisonment, stealing by a maximum of 25 years imprisonment, causing harm by 10 years."
He called on students to always use dialogue to solve problems and expressed the hope that students of the school would not jump on the bandwagon of lawlessness and violence.
"Those of us who had the privilege of being educated at Achimota have the responsibility to be standard-bearers of all that is noble, excellent and decent in our society."
Mrs Charlotte Brew-Graves, Headmistress of the School said these founders did not only establish high educational institutions but also built important structures like the Korle-bu Teaching Hospital and the Takoradi Harbour that provide great services to the nation.
However, these people whose efforts permeate all facets our lives were most often forgotten, she added. Mrs Brew-Graves urged the students not to compromise the high standards set by the founders but to work hard to improve upon it.
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J.H. Mensah calls for unity as Ghana
reaches 45
Accra (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - Senior Minister, J. H. Mensah, on Sunday noted that Ghana is now a matured nation and called for unity to move the country forward.
"Fellow feeling, kindness and honesty must reflect in our dealings with one another as citizens of this nation," the Senior Minister said when he represented President John Agyekum Kufuor at an inter-denominational thanksgiving service to mark the 45 years of Ghana's statehood in Accra.
The service, with a rather sparse congregation, was organised by the forum of Christian churches in the country under the theme, "healing the wounds of Ghana for development."
Among some of the dignitaries who graced the occasion, were His Lordship Justice E.K. Wiredu, the Chief Justice and Mr. Freddy Blay, the First Deputy Speaker. Mr Mensah said a general could not do any meaningful work if there was in-fighting among the army and explained that no government could build Ghana without the help of Ghanaians.
The Reverend Fred Deegbe, Past President of the Ghana Baptist Convention, in a sermon, urged those in places of influence to help the less fortunate in society. He said sin in various forms, including corruption and cheating could paralyse the nation and called on Ghanaians to search their hearts diligently and change their ways. He said: "we shall all appear before the judgement throne of God to give an account of what we have done with our bodies while on earth."
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - The Old Vandals Association (OVA) said on Saturday that the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana has given an indication to lift various sanctions imposed on students of Commonwealth Hall following their unruly and indecent behaviour during the celebration of Vandals Day last November.
A statement signed by Alhaji Razak El-Alawa, Greater Accra President of OVA, said Prof. Ivan Addae-Mensah gave the assurance during a meeting with the National Executive of OVA.
It said this was after the student body had unreservedly apologised for their indecent behaviour, which had caused a lot of embarrassment to the Old Vandals and Hall Authorities.
The statement said the Old Vandals only agreed to intervene provided the students apologised to the Vice Chancellor, the Chairman and members of the Senate of the Old Vandals.
The statement quoted the Vice-Chancellor as saying he was left with no option than to forgive the students since the Hall authorities had accepted the apology from the students and had initiated moves to unconditionally lift the ban on introductory letters to the students of Commonwealth Hall for passports and visas. Prof. Addae-Mensah denied that the sanctions ever included a ban on the students going to the Balm Library or to seek medical attention at the University Library.
In a letter to the Vice-Chancellor after the acceptance of the students' apology, the Master of Commonwealth Hall, Mr Harry Akussah, said the sanctions placed on the students had achieved the purpose of drawing the attention of students, particularly Commonwealth Hall students and parents, to the fact that indecent and unruly behaviour would not be tolerated.
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Ho (Volta Region) 04 March 2002 - The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) would not repeat the mistakes of overthrowing democratic and constitutional governments anymore.
The right to make or unmake governments is reserved for the electorate through the ballot box every four years, Captain John Boglo of the Medium Mortar Regiment (MMR), Ho, said this at an open-day, on Saturday.
Answering questions on why soldiers staged coups and whether this would be repeated, Captain Boglo explained that unlike the past, soldiers are now being educated to appreciate and accept the value of democracy and constitutionalism.
Captain Boglo said politicians formerly played on the ignorance of some soldiers to stage coups where they stayed in the background and exploited the situation. He noted that it was a pride to be a soldier as it is a noble profession because "we protect you at the peril of our lives".
The lives of soldiers "are built on discipline and orderliness which are expected to reflect in their lives both in and out of the Barracks". On why soldiers apply force in assisting the Police to maintain civil order, Captain Boglo said it is only when such force was needed that soldiers are called in and explained even that only reasonable force was applied.
Captain Boglo who was assisted by Staff Sergeant George Yogtiba took the public through the nature, history, weapons of the Regiment and its exploits in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Lebanon.
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Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 04 March 2002 - Mr. J.H. Mensah, Senior Minister said on Saturday that Ghana was poor because the nation's productivity of work was low.
Productivity is low because the technologies that were applied to the processes of working and living were generally backward, Mr Mensah said at the 35th congregation of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi during which 2,341 graduants made up of 1,800 men and 531 women received their certificates. Out of the number, 115 obtained first class honours.
He noted that this situation was especially so in farming, which was by far the largest single occupation in the country, adding, "there is a long technological road to travel before we attain acceptable levels of agricultural productivity". The senior minister said until the country raised her productivity and modernised her technology, it could not escape the unnecessary trap of mass poverty.
Mr Mensah therefore, charged the university to utilise its vast reservoir of knowledge to think out novel and more efficient ways to solve the problems of science, technology and engineering confronting the nation, adding, "I refer to poverty, disease, ignorance, hunger, low productivity, social marginalisation and sheer deprivation".
He said, in recent years, certain ideologies in the field of national development had tried to persuade the country that virtually the only priority in the expenditure of public money for education was to attain universal basic education.
"We members of the present NPP government have always questioned and doubted that prescription. The myriad problems of Ghana's society and economy have to be solved at many different levels, each of them requiring from its managers a different content and level of education".
He pointed out that entrepreneurship, sound industrial management, good governance, professional social services, physical nation-building could not be supplied out of universal basic education.
The Senior Minister told the university that in order that the nation could benefit fully from the fruits of the research of members of the faculty, it was important for the lecturers to re-examine their methods of teaching to see how effective they were in maintaining the academic succession of the university.
"By sharing your experience and original thinking, and thereby stimulating the curiosity and enthusiasm of your students you could assure a continuing supply of recruits to the academic life," he said.
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Tamale (Northern Region) 04 March 2002 - The Vice President Alhaji Alui Mahama on Sunday led a large government delegation to the final funeral rites of the late Alhaji Mahamadu Maida, Former Northern Regional chairman of the NDC, who died in Tamale on February 21.
The delegation included Mr. Dan Botwe, General Secretary of the NPP, Alhaji Malik Alhassan Yakubu, the Interior Minister, Alhaji Mustapha Idrissu Ali, Deputy Foreign Minister, Mr Kwamena Bartels, Minister of Private Sector Developemnt, Dr. Majeed Haroon, Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture and Prince Imoro Andani, Northern Regional Minister.
President John Agyekum Kufuor donated one million cedis, two bags of rice and two crates of soft drinks to the bereaved family, while the Vice President, Alhaji Mahama also donated 1.2 million cedis and five bags of rice to the family.
In a tribute, Vice President Mahama described the late Alhaji Maida as a kind man, honourable and very persuasive, saying, "these qualities of Alhaji Maida are worthy of emulation". The former President, Flt. Lt. Jerry John Rawlings also led a large delegation of NDC officials to pay their last respect to their former Regional chairman.
The NDC delegation included Dr. Obed Asamoah, Former Minister of Justice and Attorney-General, Alhaji Mahama Iddrisu, Former Presidential Adviser on Governmental Affairs, Mr. Alban Bagbin, Minority Leader in Parliament, Mr Issifu Ali, National Co-chairman of the NDC and Alhaji Huudu Yahaya, General Secretary.
Former President Rawlings donated two million cedis to the bereaved family and gave two hundred thousand cedis to the Muslims who recited the Koran for the late regional chairman. The NDC donated two million cedis, one cow, one bag each of maize and rice and crates of assorted soft drinks to the family.
The Northern Regional NDC Secretariat donated one bag each of maize and rice and two million cedis to the family. Dr. Obed Asamoah on his own behalf donated one million cedis to the family of the late chairman.
In a tribute, Flt. Lt. Rawlings said the principles that the late Alhaji Maida stood for would forever remain alive and described him as a man full of values that cut across all political lines, noting that, that was why both NPP and NDC were present at his funeral.
The former President suggested to the Tamale Municipal Authority to consider naming one of the streets in the municipality after Alhaji Maida as an honour for his good works.
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Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 04 March 2002 --The Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) has constituted a committee to oversee the naming and possible re-naming of all streets in the metropolis.
The 38-member committee, which is under the chairmanship of Mr A. Appiah-Menka, an industrialist, is charged to compile a comprehensive list of all streets in Kumasi.
It is also to set guidelines or criteria for auctioning the streets, suggest advertising strategies and how to get interested personalities to bid. The committee is further charged to advise on any relevant issues pertaining to future development of streets in the metropolis and any other duties that may be delegated by the assembly.
Inaugurating the committee in Kumasi on Friday, the Ashanti Regional Minister, Mr Sampson Kwaku Boafo, said naming the streets would not only help immortalised local heroes and prominent citizens in Ashanti, but would also help generate revenue for the assembly.
He said the project would also offer opportunities to the citizens to contribute towards the development of the metropolis as well as offering easy access to sites and locations by courier service operators and tourists.
Mr Boafo called on the members of the committee to strive to recognise all known and unknown personalities, who had contributed immensely to the building and development of Kumasi and name some of the streets after them.
The Metropolitan Chief Executive, Mr Maxwell Kofi Jumah, said it was a shame that in this modern world, nobody in Kumasi could tell friends, who wanted to visit him the street on which his home or offices were located.
He said the time had come for the city to move with modern trends, adding that, properly named streets would enable the people locate places and buildings and make it easier and cheaper to move around to do business.
Mr Appiah-Menka said a time had come for the city authorities to device new strategies to generate revenue since the daily market tolls were not sufficient to meet the expenditure of the assembly. He pledged the commitment of the committee to ensure streets in Kumasi were properly named to bring the city to international status.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - Six members of the British House of Commons International Development Steering Committee arrived in Accra on Sunday for a one-week visit during which they would seek to deepen their understanding of the UK's development partnership with Ghana as a contribution towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals in the context of NEPAD.
A statement issued by the British High Commission in Accra said the parliamentarians would also want to understand the major challenges, which Ghana faces in achieving these development goals and the proposed national framework to address these - the Ghana Poverty Reduction Strategy.
Those expected are Tony Baldry, Tony Worthington, Tony Colman, Hugh Bayley, John Battle, and Andrew Robatham. The statement said during their visit the Committee would split into two groups and tour the Ashanti, Brong Ahafo, Central, Greater Accra, Northern and Western Regions.
One group would look at education, overcoming obstacles to private sector growth and natural resources conservation issues. The other would look at health and promoting sustainable livelihoods for poverty reduction. Both groups would look at tackling vulnerability and exclusion, and strengthening governance for poverty reduction.
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Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) 04 March 2002 - The Third African Development Forum (ADF3) designed to increase the pace of regional economic integration on the continent opens in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, on Monday.
The Forum scheduled to run from March 3 to 8, is a joint initiative by the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the Organisation of African Unity, now African Union, to position an African-driven development agenda that reflects a consensus and commitment by African leaders to create the African Union.
It would be under the theme: Defining Priorities for Regional Integration. Peter G. Robleh, Co-ordinator of ADF3, told the Ghana News Agency that the Forum would provide an opportunity for representatives of civil society organisations andopinion makers to dialogue and interact on the issue of regional economic integration.
"The audience at the Forum, about 1,000 would consist of government ministers, senior officials, parliamentarians, heads of regional and sub-regional organisations, prominent African entrepreneurs and representatives of media organisations.
"It will, in fact, be one of the largest gatherings of Africa experts and stakeholderss to discuss the issue of regional integration during the transition to the African Union."
Mr Robleh said it was a unique opportunity for them to engage the OAU, African Development Bank and the ECA for a constructive input into the process of the
African Union. "It is hoped that this will be the beginning of dialogue that can be formalised," he added.
Subjects that would be discussed include "Integration in other parts of the world: Lessons for Africa", "Physical Integration through Infrastructural Development", "Economic Policies for Accelerated Regional Integration, Peace and Security and the Way Forward. There would be a closed-door session outlining priorities for implementation for the Heads of State meeting.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - The Board of Directors of the Ghana News Agency (GNA) has thrown its weight behind the General Manager, Mr Robert Kafui Johnson, saying it has confidence in his integrity and capabilities.
The Board said in a statement signed by Mrs Georgina Baiden, Chairperson, that their attention had been drawn to publications in the Statesman and Ghanaian Times alleging financial malpractices against Mr Johnson.
It said prior to the publications, a special committee made up of the GNA Board and local union had investigated the allegations, which Mr A.S. Adjei, the then union chairman, had made in September 2001 in a petition to the then Minister for Media Relations.
It said most of the events Mr. Adjei alluded to, were before Mr Johnson joined GNA. "The Committee found the allegations to be motivated by mischief and 'a deliberate attempt to malign the chief executive.”
"Based on our knowledge of events at the GNA, the Board would like to affirm its confidence in the integrity and capabilities of Mr Johnson and urge the public to ignore the publications."
The Board said it was also aware that the National Media Commission was handling the matter and would make its findings known in due course. "The Board urges media houses, in the interest of fair play, to crosscheck allegations about GNA before publishing stories that go to destroy the reputation of GNA and demoralise staff," the statement said.
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Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 04 March 2002 --Major Courage Quashigah (rtd), Minister of Food and Agriculture, said on Friday that the country would not experience the shortage of the major food staples this year.
The ministry has so far purchased about 10,000 tonnes of maize for storage as part of the strategic food reserve programme, Major Quashigah said at the launching of the ministry's pilot food security programme for Ashanti in Kumasi where about 36,000 mini bags of maize and 8,000 bags of rice had already been stored.
The Minister noted that the current situation where the country import food to the tune of 500 million dollars annually was unacceptable and the government was therefore, determined to remedy this situation.
Major Quashigah said on assumption of office, he pledged to reduce the country's food import bill on rice by 30 percent by the year 2004 and therefore, started with the rehabilitation of all irrigation projects in the country and the result was that for the first time in several years, farmers at the Afife irrigation project cropped all the 800 acres of land and were now asking for the cropping of more land.
There is no doubt that this country's development depended on agriculture, he said, pointing out that if Ghanaians patronised local rice they would not only be saving the country the much needed foreign exchange, but would be creating jobs for a lot of people who will be involved in the rice industry.
The Agriculture Minister therefore, appealed to Ghanaians to patronise the locally produced rice, explaining that though it may not compare favourably with the imported rice, it was much more nutritious than the imported rice some of which had been stored for more than 10 years.
Major Quashigah said the situation in the country was not one of the hopelessness but that it looked like people had abandoned the country and instead were depending on the importation of everything and gave the assurance that the NPP government was determined to remedy the situation.
Mr S.K. Boafo, Ashanti Regional Minister, advised Ghanaians to change their tastes in favour of locally produced food items, saying that this must start from the homes, schools, hospitals and other institutions.
He said if Ghanaians did not change their tastes for the consumption of imported food items, the stocking of the locally produced items being embarked upon would be a waste of resources and energy.
Mr Boafo said the government had noted with concern the predicted poor food supply situation in the country due to the vagaries of the weather experienced in some food producing areas of the country.
"I believe it is this anticipated gloomy situation of food supply regime that had pushed the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to put in place this medium term food security plans for the country."
The Regional Minister noted that with the launching of this medium term pilot food security programme therefore, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture was on its way to attain long term food sufficiency which the NPP government promised the people.
Mr Chris Bakaweri of Technoserve, said his organisation had assisted a selected number of small and medium businesses across the country to leverage over 4.5 billion cedis to stockpile over 3,500 tons of rice, maize and cowpea to address food security in the country.
Earlier, Major Quashigah had inspected four out of eight silos belonging to the Ghana Food Distribution Corporation (GFDC), which had broken down over the past 36 years for the storage of maize.
Mr E. Kodzo Dumenu, Project Co-ordinator of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and the Small-Scale Holder Input Supply and Marketing Project (SCIMP), told the Minister that if the four rehabilitated silos proved successful the remaining four would also be rehabilitated, adding that the four rehabilitated silos could hold 2,400 tonnes of maize.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 March 2002 - The Achimota School Cadet Corps on Saturday held a ceremonial parade as part of activities marking the 75th Founders' Day celebration of the school.
The Founders' Day is held every first Saturday in March and starts with a parade in remembrance of the founders of the school who include Sir Gordon Guggisberg, Reverend Alexander Fraser and Dr. Kwegyir Aggrey. Other activities include tree planting, a durbar and thanksgiving service.
The parade reviewed by Major General Carl Coleman, Commandant of the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College was made up of 60 cadets and six officers with music provided by the Fifth Battalion of Infantry Corps of Drums.
The Cadet, commanded by school cadet Samir Bou-Chedid, a final year science student, was formed in 1955 and had contributed in furtherance of the noble objectives for setting up such corps in schools and colleges. It had since been sponsored by the Recce Regiment of the Ghana Armed Forces which has provided uniforms, instructors and logistics support for training.
Maj. Gen. Coleman who is also an old Achimotan of the 1964 year-group said the formation of the cadet corps had gone a long way to produce men and women imbued with integrity, patriotism and a high sense of service to Ghana and other African countries.
"Cadets all times set good examples by refraining from acts of carelessness, insubordination, display of impudence, disrespect and unruly behaviour, which sadly to say, often characterises the conduct of some students in some institutions."
Maj. Gen. Coleman noted that the cadet corps had more females than male students and urged more males to join since it formed the basic fundamentals of gaining admission into the Military Academy, which would soon be upgraded into a degree awarding institution.
Awards were presented to 11 members of the cadet corps for outstanding performance with the overall best student cadet and parade commander award going to Master Samir Bou-Chedid.
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Abetefi (Eastern Region) 04 March 2002 – The Government says it would continue to allocate financial resources to the country's training colleges to raise the falling standards of education within basic schools.
Teachers have therefore been urged to rededicate themselves to this social obligation and work hard to improve the standards of education in the country.
Professor Christopher Ameyaw Akumfi, Minister of Education, announcing this at the 50th anniversary celebration of the Abetefi Training College at Abetefi in the Eastern Region, said since basic schoolteachers play a significant role in the country's educational system, it is important to properly train them to make an impact in a fast growing scientific and technological world.
Professor Akumfi urged teachers to ensure the success of the government's vision of positive change and zero tolerance for corruption and see to the eradication of all forms of misconduct such as absenteeism, misuse of teaching time and insubordination among others, in the country’s educational institutions.
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