Police Chief, Kwesi Alhaji, Others Slapped With GH¢200M Suit
The Chief Executive of 21st Century Construction Company Limited, Mr. Kofi Asmah, and three other real estate development companies have dragged the Kasoa Millennium City Police District Commander, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Benjamin Samani, the self-styled Mankralo, of Gomoa Fetteh Divisional Area, Kwesi Quansah, aka Alhaji Kwasi, and nine others to the Agona Swedru High Court in the Central Region, for allegedly causing damages to their landed properties.
The defendants in the case are: the Mankralo of Gomoa Fetteh Stool, Alhaji Kwasi, DSP Benjamin Samani, Kwasi Otoo, Kwame Asamoah, Alhassan Amidu, Salifu, alias Black Rasta, Takyi Ofosu, Abdul Rahman, Mutakuriru Mohammed, Gomoa East District Assembly and Central Regional Lands Commission of Ghana.
The suit is in connection with DSP Samani (who is the 2nd defendant) and some land-guards’ allegedly supporting the Mankralo of Gomoa Fetteh Area (1st defendant) and his cronies to resell the real estate development companies lands to some unsuspecting Ghanaians and organisations at the expense of the real estate developers.
In the Statement of Claim, the real estate companies averred that they legally acquired their lands between 1996 and 1997, through a lease agreement for 99 years from the Chief of Gomoa Fetteh Divisional Stool, Nana Abor Ewusie XIX, and the elders of Gomoa Fetteh Stool who were the allodia owners of the lands at Kasoa Millennium City.
They claimed in the suit that they subsequently registered their lands at the Lands Commission of Ghana and provided the land registration certificates to prove their claim in the writ of summons.
They stated that the Mankralo of Gomoa Fetteh Stool with the support of DSP Samani, Kwasi Otoo, Kwame Asamoah, Alhassan Amidu, Salifu, alias Black Rasta, Takyi Ofosu, Abdul Rahman, Mutakuriru Mohammed allegedly demolished the building structures and also resold the said lands they had acquired legally without recourse to the law of registration of lands at the Lands Commission.
Against this backdrop, the plaintiffs comprising 21st Century Construction Company, Adom Spinning Company Limited, Gelina Tropical Company Limited, Asmah Production Company Limited, Oba Ahema Company Limited have jointly slapped the eleven (11) defendants with GH¢200,000,000 suit for damages on their landed properties.
The Writ of Summons filed by the counsel of the Plaintiffs, Mr Augustine Gyamfi of Nkrabeah and Associates Law Firm in Accra, is seeking an order directed at the first Defendant, the Mankralo of Gomoa Fetteh, from using the police from the Kasoa Millennium City Police District Command to resell their vast lands to unsuspecting Ghanaians.
They are also praying the court to stop Alhaji Kwasi and his associates from using landguards to demolish building structures on their lands.
The plaintiffs are also seeking an order of injunction directed at the defendants, agents, assigns, and privies from continuing to make any further move to use the notorious landguards and police officers to rain mayhem on artisans of the real estate developers and those individuals who bought the lands from them at Kasoa-Millennium City and its surrounding communities
Addressing a press conference to throw more light on the issue, Mr Asmah and three other land developers gave hints of how senior police officers at Kasoa-Millennium City Police District Command together with some top officials of the Gomoa East District Assembly and the Central Regional Lands Commission were in league with the illegal activities of scores of notorious land-guards.
According to them, the police, particularly the Station Commander, DSP Samani, and other self-seeking government officials were allegedly supporting landguards to brutalise owners of real estate development companies and individual land developers who have legally bought lands from them at the Kasoa-Millennium City and adjoining communities.
That frightening situation, they stressed, required the urgent need for government to reshuffle police officers at the station.
Furthermore, the distraught real estate developers accused DSP Samani of allegedly using his wife to cook foods on daily basis for the landguards who have been tormenting their clients.
However, they commended the Accra Regional Police Command on efforts to flush out landguards in the region, and stressed the urgent need for the Police Administration to extend same operation to the Kasoa-Millennium City.
According to the real estate developers, if the police were looking for an area that had become a point or headquarters for landguard operations, Kasoa-Millennium City.
They stated that these group of miscreants had become so notorious that the police at Kasoa-Millennium City District Command who were supposed to clamp down on their activities were unable to match them boot-for-boot, resulting in fear and insecurity in that part of the region.
They noted that life was increasingly becoming dangerous for land developers and residents at Kasoa-Millennium City and its adjoining environs, because anybody can become a target or victim of these “scoundrels, wretched, lawless, villains, murderers and trespassers,” who have no consideration and respect for human lives.”
The real estate land developers grieved over the two police personnel who were shot last week by some gunmen in Kasoa and also the Chief of Gomoa Akranmang, Nana Egyiri, popularly known in the community as ‘Osibo,’ who was murdered in cold blood on Monday, September 9, 2019.
However, when this paper contacted DSP Benjamin Samani via telephone yesterday for his reaction, he denied supporting the Mankrado of Gomoa Fetteh Stool to use landguards to resell and demolish landed properties of real estate development companies in the area.
What is more, he debunked the allegation of his wife cooking food for the landguards in the area, describing these allegations as very bad and character defamation, saying although his wife sells Kenkey (a Ga delicacy) to many different people, he could not identify whether her customers were dealing in landguard activities or not.
According to him, immediately he was posted to the area, Mr Asmah came to him in his office to solicit for his support to arrest the Mankralo of Gomoa Fetteh and his followers which will enable the latter take the lands Kasoa-Millennium City lands from Gomoa Fetteh Stool.
He confirmed that he had been served with writ of summons over the issue, but said that through his lawyer he had filed a statement of defense.
