By William Yaw Owusu
Wednesday October 5, 2011.
Mike Ahey, one of the best athletes the country has ever produced, had a rude shock of his life last Saturday when police men from the Madina Police Division subjected him to severe beatings for reasons best known to them.
He has therefore petitioned the Police Intelligence and Professional Standards Bureau (PIPS) at the Police Headquarters in Accra to investigate what he termed the “Professional misconduct by policemen from the Divisional Police Headquarters – Madina.”
Narrating his ordeal to DAILY GUIDE yesterday, Mr. Ahey, a Commonwealth Games medalist, said he was supervising the fixing of his gate in front of his house when a team of uniformed and plainclothes police officers parked a vehicle right beside him and dashed to the area where the drug peddlers operate to arrest some people.
“I saw that they had arrested some innocent persons, including a dressmaker who was sewing in her kiosk and her brother who had come to visit her, and some drug users, so I informed the police officers that the real culprits were still around and that these were innocent people.
“I then told them that at least they should have approached those of us in the neighbourhood to point out to them the real culprits and not have conducted themselves in the manner they did which would only lead to innocent persons being victimized.”
According to the 69-year-old, one of the policemen, whose name tag read Gyamfi, alleged that “if you are sensible you would have sacked the drug peddlers from our neighbourhood and that if you have failed to do so and we are doing our job, you have no business complaining.”
He said he insisted that the police were arresting the wrong people and in the process the arresting officers entered the opposite house, adding “the next thing I saw was that they were beating one of my daughters called Aurelia and when the elder sister called May protested against the beatings they attacked her and beat her also.”
Mr. Ahey said the policemen, led by Gyamfi pursued Aurelia to his bedroom, adding, “I attempted to come between my daughter and the policemen, asking Gyamfi what she had done to deserve the physical assault and all this while, seven of the drug peddlers were there looking on as the policemen turned their guns on us.
“As I tried to rescue my daughter one of the policemen went behind me, booted me down, hit me with the butt of his gun and as I struggled to get on my feet he slapped and kicked me until the man who was working on my gate called Karim came to rescue me.”
He said Aurelia was detained at the Madina Police Station cell until 7:00 pm, adding “when I went to the police station to lodge a complaint the same Gyamfi insisted that nobody was going to take a statement from me and that if I do not take care they would put me in handcuffs.”
He said he personally moved to the Madina Police Station, ClD Anti-Narcotics office at the police Headquarters and the MP for Abokobi-Madina, Alhaji Amadu Sorogho to report the activities of drug peddlers but to not avail.
Mr. Ahey alleged that those arrested were released and they targeted his family saying “it is apparent that they picked the information from their police sources about who had lodged the complaint.”
“These criminals have always taunted me and my family boasting that nothing would come out of the complaints I continue to make because they have bought the Madina Police and other police units.”
Ahey, a gold medalist at the 1962 Commonwealth Games in Perth, Australia, also won silver in the 4 by 100 relay race at the same event.
The tall and lanky Ahey, a three-time Olympian competed in the 1964 Tokyo, Japan Games, 1968 Mexico City, Mexico Games and the 1972 Munich, Germany Games.
His 1962 long jump national record of 8.19 meters stood for decades until it was smashed in 2004 by new sensation, Ignatius Gaisah of Ghana at the All Africa Games in Abuja, Nigeria
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