Indication the confession and Ill stop – How Kufour’s Francis Poku tortured past due Kojo Tsikata into coma nonstop

For several latter day followers associated with Ghana’s political history, title Francis Poku is linked to the Kufour administration between i b?rjan p? tv?tusentalet and 2009 when this individual served as a security key. However it is emerging that this security capo who proved helpful in the security services plus served in seven various administrations was instrumental in a variety of torture incidents under the Best Military Council (SMC) from the 1970s including an event involving Captain Kojo Tsikata who passed on yesterday. Within a testimony before the National Getting back together Commission (NRC), Captain Kojo Tsikata had revealed that will in 1975, Francis Poku then a Deputy Superintendent associated with Police ordered him tortured and beaten until this individual went unconscious. Kojo Tsikata is someone who has been offender of human rights violations during the PNDC days unfortunately he making the point that he themselves has been a victim of individual rights abuses under the hands of General Acheampong plus Francis Poku. Francis Poku who had a dubious report under the Kufour administration since National Security Minister plus was sacked under questionable circumstances was a member of the particular SMC told Tsikata he previously to sign some documents confessing to a crime associated with attempting to topple the SMC regime but which Tsikata refused. This was in Nov 1975 during the SMC routine of General Acheampong whenever Tsikata was arrested with gunpoint at a friend’s home by one Captain Appiah-Asante of Military Intelligence. He or she was stripped naked plus detained for six weeks within darkness in a cell with Special Branch Headquarters, calculating about 6ft by 4ft without any windows, with just a blanket to cover his entire body and to lie on. This individual was not told the reason for their detention and was not permitted to see any member of their family despite repeated demands. Read Tsikata’s statement beneath about Francis Poku that clocked 80 years last 30 days: Subsequently I was told I used to be being investigated on mistrust of involvement in a storyline to overthrow the government. I actually recall an occasion when I has been locked in a room with all the battered, bleeding and subconscious body of Major Quarshie, another detainee, and cautioned by Lance Corporal Ebo Duncan that if I did not really co-operate I would suffer exactly the same fate. I was taken, on the number of occasions clad just in my blanket, before the panel chaired by Mister. Francis Poku, at the time the Deputy Superintendent of Law enforcement at the Special Branch. The particular panel included Major Oppong-Addae of Military Intelligence, plus Mr. Abudu and Mister. Anafi of the Special Department. Once, when I appeared prior to the Panel, Mr Francis Poku said he had orders in the SMC to beat me personally to death if I did not write a confession across the lines he was recommending and advised me in order to co-operate, as he did not would like anybody’s death on his mind. When I refused to write this kind of statement he got upset, insulted me and inquired Sergeant Boateng to take me personally to a special room upper level. This was the torture area where I was immediately fixed upon by Sgt Boateng, Cpl Ebo Duncan plus Cpl Seidu, and seriously brutalised until I grew to become unconscious. When I came circular I was lying in a swimming pool of blood in the wedding reception room downstairs. The next early morning Mr. Francis Poku went to me in my cell plus, pretending to apologise with regard to what had happened the prior day, said that he had simply no alternative as he was pressurized from the SMC to get a admission from me. A few days afterwards Capt Dr . Duncan had been sent to examine me plus treat me for our injuries. This pattern associated with torture followed by visits through Mr Francis Poku through Capt (Dr. ) Duncan was repeated a number of situations between December 1975 plus January 1976. One day the particular young women working at the workplaces of the Interrogation Centre had been invited to watch the pain session. I remember that Cpl Seidu was nicknamed “Carpenter” because one of his features was to hammer fingernails into the testicles and ram memory sticks into the anuses associated with suspects. In January 1976 I was transferred to Usher Fortification Prison. There I fulfilled a 63 year-old guy, Ebenezer Allotey, who recounted similar experiences at the hands of exactly the same torture squad. He flattened and died a few days later on in my presence. The case associated with Mr Allotey as well as our case and others are noted by the human rights company Amnesty International. It is significant that will some of the perpetrators of these violations currently occupy high jobs in the country’s security equipment. No political tradition or even grouping, no regime or even institution has had a monopoly on the abuse of the legal rights of fellow citizens within our country’s history. It is critical that this exercise of reconciliation ought to be comprehensive and not be seen because selective, partisan or discriminatory. Although this Commission is just not officially named a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” it is necessary that the truth of claimed abuses be established, that will claims as to what happened are usually verified and assessed within their context and that deliberately fake claims be dismissed plus treated with the contempt which they deserve. It should not be the situation that anything goes, or even that the more dramatic plus exaggerated an allegation will be the more likely it is to be made welcome as truth provided it really is directed against a particular program or particular individuals. Supply: MyNewsGh. com/2021
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