Police Orders 90- Year- Old Man To Stand In The Sun For 5 Hours For Not Wearing Nose Mask
A 90-year-old man, Opanin Kwamena Nsonowaa is reported to have been ordered by the Twifo Atti-Morkwa district police command to stand in the fiery sun for close to five agonizing hours for allegedly not wearing a nose mask.
Recounting the incident that occurred on January 21, Opanin Kwamena Nsonowaa, a resident of Ashire in the Twifo Atti-Morkwa district of the Central Region stated that he had gone to visit his 75-year-old wife who was in admission at the Twifo Praso government hospital.
While there, he was advised by the doctor on duty to buy some fruits and drugs to facilitate the treatment of his wife. According to Opanin Nsonowaa, on his way back to the hospital after acquiring the items, he was confronted by the police who asked him why he didn’t have a mask on.
He disclosed that when he failed to produce one, the police quickly picked him to the Twifo Praso district Police Station.
Opanin Nsonowaa lamented that upon the arrival of the police station, he was ordered by the police to stand in the scorching sun from around 9:00 am in the morning until the district police commander returns from day patrol.
The 90-year-old man revealed that he pleaded with the police to pardon him and allow him to go and see his wife at the hospital as she was seriously ill and needed the items he had purchased.
Unfortunately, his plea landed on deaf ears.
“I held the items fastened in a polythene bag until around 2:00 pm before the commander returned from duty to prepare a caution note for me and finally discharged me”.
“I stood in the melting sun from 9:00 am to 2:00 pm. I was very thirsty and hungry but the police never allowed me to eat and drink for about five intimidating hours.
“I was very sad because I thought that I was too old for such inhumane kind of a treatment and I was wondering what might have happened to my sick wife whom I was to present the items to”.
He appealed to the president of the Republic Nana Addo Dankwaa Akufo-Addo to ensuring that there is enough publicity of education on subject of this nature so that those in the rural folks would be well abreast and informed before he vests the powers in the security agencies to “discipline people like that”.
In the president’s latest update on the Ghana’s status in the fight against the pandemic, he tasked the Inspector General of Police to enforce full compliance of the Covid-19 protocols across the length and breadth of the country.
This comes after an upsurge in the number of active cases in the country within a month.
It is against this backdrop that the Twifo Atti-Morkwa district police command on last Thursday embarked on the mass arrest of offenders of the president’s order.
At least one hundred people were apprehended and subsequently cautioned by the Twifo Atti-Morkwa district police command.