The Tarkwa District Court B has seen 51 people who are accused of attacking Golden Star Wassa Limited (GSWL) workers and destroying a number of the business’s properties.
The accused individuals who were detained in groups have not had their sworn declarations heard.
In order to give the ongoing investigations time to be completed, the prosecution, Superintendent Juliana Essel-Dadzie, pleaded with the court, which was presided over by Judge Isaac Osei Asare, to remand the accused for two weeks.
Given the amount of people detained thus far, she claimed that releasing anyone on bond would obstruct their investigation, adding that “we need more time to look into the situation.
This will enable us to focus our efforts just on the criminals while releasing the innocent.
However, counsels for eight of the accused persons, Bright Baiden and Jacob Acquah-Sampson, prayed to the court to grant their clients bail.
“Our clients have been in police custody for a while and since they have intelligent and competent officers, they should have completed their investigation. Our clients provide the income that their respective families to live and life is becoming unbearable for them,” they pleaded to the court.
After hearing both parties, Justice Isaac Osei Asare said he would rule on the bail application on Friday, April 14, 2023.
Meanwhile, the Group Corporate Affairs Manager of GSWL, Mr Gerard Boakye who was present in court with some employees after the proceedings, told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that, “we have not gotten into the case yet mainly because the police requested for more time to engage the suspects because the first set of suspects they arrested paved the way to apprehend more, so I think all is in line with making sure that people are not wrongful judged”.
“We have no problem with the proceedings because we are a law-abiding company, we also believe in human rights of people, we work and fight for that, so we are not disturbed that the law will take its course,” he added.
On Thursday, March 16, 2023, some illegal miners from Subriso in the Tarkwa-Nsuaem Municipality of the Western Region attacked employees of GSWL over illegal mining activities at one of the company’s concessions.
The illegal miners injured some employees, smashed the windscreens of 22 dumper trucks, set ablaze 12 vehicles which included excavators, ambulances, land cruisers, pick-ups and part of the administrative block of the company.