There was heavy security presence at the Koforidua Circuit Court ‘B’ as 12 suspects arrested in connection with the Somanya riot reappeared in court Tuesday.
About 30 armed police officers mostly from the National Swat team and the Eastern regional Rapid Deployment Force Unit were on guard during the trial.
Many sympathizers of the suspects were prevented from entering the court.
Refusing an oral bail application by the defense counsel, Simon Animley, the court presided by Her Honour Mercy Adei Kotei remanded the suspects on the request of the prosecutor.
They are to reappear on June 27, 2017.
The accused persons are Adamptey Ebenezer Jones Dendenden, Assembly member for Sawed electoral area, Teye Isreal, a taxi driver, Michael Adjei Nortey, a student, Theophilus Narh, a carpenter, Kossivi Amana, a cook, Wisdom Tetteh, a carpenter and Jerry George, a tractor operator.
The rest are; Wisdom Sackitey Laweh, a mobile banker, Senyo George, a glass fabricator, Felix Tawiah, a welder, Tetteh Emmanuel, a sprayer and Bacha Emmanuel, a student .
Background
The fact of the case presented by the Prosecutor, Chief Inspector Kofi Bragogyi indicated that Staff of ECG in Somanya detected illegal consumption of power in their system hence decided to investigate through which a block factory located at Sawed electoral area belonging to the assembly member for the area was detected to have illegally connected power.
On Monday May 22, 2017, an ECG worker went to distribute electricity bills but on reaching the Block Factory of the Assembly member, he violently prevented the ECG staff and also rejected the bill stating the amount was too high.
According to the Prosecutor, the Assembly member (1st accused person) subsequently incited the residents against officials of ECG. On Friday May 26, 2017, the electricity company of Ghana, disconnected the power supply to the Assembly member’s block factory but he illegally reconnected the power.
The Prosecutor further mentioned that, later in the day, a taskforce was detailed to disconnect power to the block factory since he had failed to pay bills from November 2015 to May 2017 but the staff of ECG were attacked and assaulted by the Assembly member and his people.
On the same day at about 8:30am, the assembly member (1st accused) mobilized the accused persons and over 500 youth from his electoral area and violently marched to the ECG office to cause damage to the glass windows and sliding doors and the windscreen of a Nissan pick-up vehicle with registration number GP 2506.
