The jailed robbers
An Accra Circuit Court yesterday sentenced the three persons standing trial for robbing Akua Donkor, founder of the Ghana Freedom Party (GFP), to a total of 60 years’ imprisonment with hard labour.
They are Yakubu Yusif, trader and Central Regional chairman of the GFP; Banabas Kayase, driver/secretary of the party and Abdul Razak Shaibu, a member of the Ghana Private Road Transport Union (GPRTU) taskforce.
The court, presided over by Aboagye Tandoh, on July 20, 2017 acquitted and discharged Opoku Agyemang, a trader and third accused person in the trial because the prosecution failed to connect him to the case.
The judge had held that no matter how hard the prosecution tried to implicate Opoku Agyemang, the link to the case was too weak to make him open his defence.
Mr. Tandoh stated that the prosecution had failed to adduce sufficient evidence against Opoku Agyemang.
Opoku’s acquittal followed a submission of no case filed by his lawyer, Vincent Aikins, insisting that his client was innocent of the charges.
Charges
The accused persons were dragged before the court on January 9, this year for conspiring to rob and robbing the maverick 2016 GFP flag bearer on December 30, 2016 at Taifa in Accra.
According to the prosecutor, Chief Superintendent Duutu Tuaruka, the three persons conspired at about 2:30 am at Sowutuom, a suburb of Accra, robbed Akua at gunpoint and snatched her travelling bag containing plane ticket, Ghanaian passport, Voter’s ID card, $30,000 and GH¢3,000.
Two other accomplices – Joe and Nuamah aka Lion – are currently on the run.
Sentence
Sentencing the accused persons, Mr. Tandoh stated that the accused persons, in their evidence before the court, contradicted themselves, adding that “the evidences of the accused persons were full of half truths; the court is unable to put any weight on them, thereby woefully failing the evidence discourse.”
He said that the court was convinced that the three robbed Akua of her $30,000 and that Razak, who had the money bag, played a fast one on the others.
Mr. Tandoh said $4,900 was the remainder of the money the police retrieved from the convicts.
The court argued that for the charge of conspiracy to succeed, there must be evidence that the accused persons acted or agreed together to commit the offence.
The judge as a result, stated, “In the instant case based on the evidence on record, the accused persons conspired to rob and indeed robbed her and subjected her to fear of harm.”
Nana Addo Factor
The court dismissed the assertion in the course of the trial that Madam Akua Donkor was leaving the country after the December elections because Nana Addo, after winning the 2016 election, would kill her.
In the view of the court, Yakubu “is no doubt the master tactician, mastermind and the brain behind the robbery.” He indicated that if there was anyone Akua Donkor had to be afraid of, it ought to be the convicts she surrounded herself with “not Nana Addo.”
Mr. Tandoh said the political issue was just to “whip up the emotions of the court to search for the unnecessary.”
He posited that the actions and intentions of the convicts were planned and calculated “without any political interference whatsoever.”
The judge accordingly sentenced each of the three accused persons to 20 years’ imprisonment with hard labour to serve as deterrent to others.
He stated that the judgement would serve as a caution to armed robbers who pose as party activists with the intention to deceive the people they purport to support.
The sentences are to run concurrently.
Mitigation
Earlier, Kwame Gyamfi, holding the brief of Vincent Aikins for Banabas, said the accused persons are first offenders who were remorseful.
He said Banabas is a family man and youthful and urged the court to consider the years, indicating that part of the money involved had also been retrieved.
By Jeffrey De-Graft Johnson