NDC shooting: Yammin ‘fights’ police over bail for 3 remanded ‘Hawks’

Founder and bankroller of pro-National Democratic Congress (NDC) militia, ‘The Hawks’, Joseph Yammin is incensed by what he terms as an “opposition” of bail by the Ashanti Regional Police Command for some three members of the group who have been arrested in connection with the shooting incident at the party’s Ashanti Regional Secretariat that claimed one life on February 18, MyNewsGh.com reports.

The three, Dauda Ibrahim alias Wayo, 40; Agyin Samuel alias Rock, 32 and Abdul Ganiyu alias Petit 37, charged with conspiracy to commit murder, have been on remanded since March 4 after they surrendered to the police on March 1, when their names popped up in a list of 13 suspects who had been linked to the crime.

The Asokwa District Court, presided over by His Worship Abass Mohammed, has on two occasions, first on March 4 and then on March 14 denied the accused persons bail and remanded them to police custody on the grounds of their own safety since they are deemed to be involved in the incident.

Police prosecutor, ACP Okyere Darko has also on both occasions argued that, granting the accused persons bail will interfere with police investigations.

But speaking on Kumasi-based Angel Fm and monitored by MyNewsGh.com, the former Deputy Ashanti Regional Minister said, he is surprised that the police are still holding on to persons who have no links to the crime and opposing bail for them.

“One thing worries me; you see those boys who have been caged, police are refusing them bail and it worries me so much, the boys have no links to the murder so why are they in police cell as at now” he told Kwame Tanko, host of Angel Fm

He said it is public knowledge that one particular person pulled the trigger and there is no evidence that he was assisted by anybody, expressing shock by the posturing of the police.

According to him, all three were not present at the party’s secretariat at the time of the shooting; he gave the itinerary of the whereabouts of three suspects one by one thus;

Of Dauda Ibrahim, he said is a Second Deputy Youth Organiser of the NDC at Old Tafo Constituency and also a member of the Ashanti Regional NDC security committee.

He said Dauda was invited by the Ashanti Regional Chairman of the NDC, Augustus Andrews, and that he was locked up in the meeting at the time of the shooting.

He said Agyin Samuel actually was at the secretariat on the day but was as far away as the Ghana Baptist University College to buy food at the time of the shooting, so he cannot be linked to the incident.

Petit, a.k.a Abdul Ganiyu “did not go to the NDC regional office at all on the day of the incident”, Joseph Yammin said.

“They have been to court for two times and you are keeping people in cells; we don’t know, the police are refusing them bail, what kind of attitude is this”, he fumed.

“We don’t understand and these are three people that the law permits to be granted bail as the case continues”.

He bemoaned the silence of the National Democratic Congress on the matter and said if for nothing at all, one of the accused is an executive of the party in the Tafo Constituency and a member of the Regional Security Committee, “but the party is silent, nobody is talking about it”.

The three suspects are expected to reappear before the court today Wednesday, 27th March, 2019.