On Wednesday, July 6, 2021, at 6:48 a.m., I called a very senior police officer at the Ashanti Regional Police Headquarters who is involved in the management of Kaaka’s murder case.
Kaaka was the #FixTheCountry activist who was killed in Ejura after he received threats that his activities of exposing deficiencies in the area were making the government unpopular.
The police issued a statement that Kaaka was killed by his brother, but something about the facts doesn’t make sense, so I thought calling for an explanation could help.
MANASSEH: I have seen your statement that said Kaaka was murdered by his brother.
POLICE: Yes, that’s true.
MANASSEH: But from the information I have, you have three people in custody in connection with the killing of Kaaka.
POLICE: Yes, we arrested two and then arrested his brother later.
MANASSEH: Have your investigations exonerated the other two of the murder?
POLICE: No, that’s why they are still on remand, pending the next court day. We haven’t exonerated them.
MANASSEH: If you have arrested three suspects and have not exonerated the two, why did you single out Kaaka’s brother as the murderer in your press statement?
POLICE: That is why our press statement said PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATIONS. We are still investigating and will update the public as we go along, but for now, no further comment.
I was about to ask why the “preliminary investigations” were not good enough to include the two but the police statement sounded conclusive on Kaaka’s brother.
I was also about to ask why the police relied on the eye-witness account of a woman the family said arrived later at the scene of the crime and excluded the counter account of the family in the police press statement.
For now, there are no further comments. All we are invited to do is to accept the police’s narrative, which sets the agenda for government communicators and the governing party’s social media activists.
The danger here is that the frantic efforts to distance Kaaka’s death from his activism may allow the government and the police to intentionally or unintentionally make the real killers of Kaaka walk free.
We are now asked to rely solely on the police, who had issued a warning letter to Kaaka, because of his activities. We know the police cannot always be truthful.
We remember their account on the killing of the Asawase 7. We also know the initial account of the police on George Floyd’s murder.
To compound this further, the police here have not been able to work against the interest of any political party that is in power. And the committee’s apparent blame of the journalists, instead of the soldiers who shot and killed the demonstrators, will not do us any good going forward.
