It was an interesting sight at an Accra circuit court last Friday when Bismark Osei Danso, the supposed ring leader in the invasion and ransacking of the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP’s) Asylum Down head office in Accra, said he did not know the name of an accused person he claimed he mobilized to the place.
According to him, he was unable to tell the name of the ninth accused with whom he is in the dock over charges of being at the party’s premises for unlawful purposes and causing damage.
He said under cross-examination by the prosecutor, DSP Abraham Annor, that he did not know the name of the young man.
Minutes later he mentioned Obed Yawson as the ninth accused person, a name the prosecution claimed had been whispered to him.
This was after Danso, 58, had opened his defence in respect of the case, denying the claim by the prosecution that he and the group he mobilized were at the NPP head office for unlawful purpose and also caused damage to the properties of the party.
Led in evidence by his lawyer, Abdul Aziz Mohammed, Osei Danso told the court, presided over by Ruby Naa Adjeley Quayson, that he is a contractor and resident of Odorkor in Accra.
The Chase
He said the reason why he and the others went to the NPP office was that the party in 2014 went to Tamale to elect its national executives and that while he was in office there was information that the national chairman had been suspended to the displeasure of the supporters of the said chairman.
He said as a card-bearing member of the party committed to the election 2016 victory (of the NPP), he came to the party headquarters to discuss the way forward with the executives but met the Invincible Forces.
Danso stated that he and his gang were chased out of the NPP office with pieces of stick and machetes by the Invincible Forces, adding that his group, comprising persons from across the country, returned again, this time round with some of them being ex-military men.
He indicated that he led his group, called the Patriotic Group 2016, to the party’s head office in a bus at about 5:00 am on November 23, 2015.
Danso told the court that for the second time at the office they were driven away by a police team and that while making a call to the driver of the bus that conveyed them to the place, the police surrounded them and arrested them.
He denied being in possession of 3 SMG rifles, 36 rounds of ammunition and three new machetes when he was arrest.
Others
Other accused persons in the case are Abdulai Wudu, Kwame Adu Annan, Michael Agoha, Rakia Ali Mohammed and Obed Yawson, Razak Ebenezer Aduful, Kwame Adu Annan and Michael Agoha.
The rest are Obed Yawson, Rakia Ali Mohammed (a woman), Ali Iddris, Nii Teiko Ayi-Bontey, Shamzi Dinni and Ben Okyere.
Charges
According to the prosecutor, DSP Annor, the accused persons on Monday, November 23, 2015, between the hours of 1:30 and 2:30 am at Asylum Down and Kokomlemle respectively, unlawfully entered the premises of the NPP with intent to commit crime.
The accused persons are facing other charges of being at the party’s premises for unlawful purposes and causing damage.
Speaking in various Ghanaian languages, the accused persons denied the offences and were each admitted to bail in the sum of GH¢10,000 with two sureties.
They are also to execute a bail bond to be of good behaviour or in default, serve three months in jail.
By Jeffrey De-Graft Johnson