Police shooting victims' relatives protests

By William Yaw Owusu.

Monday, 24 April 2006.
RELATIVES of the two women shot dead by the police in Dansoman, Accra, on Friday, have given a harrowing account of the circumstances leading to their deaths.

The mother of one of them, Mrs Grace Opoku, has condemned police behaviour after the shooting, which she says led to the death of her daughter, who was still alive.

The two women, Lydia Opoku 41, also called Awo, and Ataa Boatemaa, 39, and two men died on the spot when police fired shots into a Daewoo Tico taxi-cab which was carrying them at an area called ‘B Opoku’ in the early hours of Friday.

Eye-witness account said that the police patrol team had earlier been informed of a robbery operation involving a Tico taxi cab around Hansonic, also in Dansoman, and were pursuing it towards Dansoman Last Stop.

The occupants on reaching Zodiac, also in Dansoman, allegedly attacked and robbed two Mrs Opoku and Ms Boatemaa.

The two women had left home at about 4.30 a.m. on their way to Lome, Togo, to transact business.

Speaking to the Times yesterday at their house at Zodiac, in Dansoman, Ms Opoku’s mother, said that on hearing the news about the shooting, she rushed to the scene.