A cultural anthropologist and senior member of the Afrikania Mission, Osofo Kofitse Ahadzi, has said the gods should wipe out the entire community of Denkyira-Obuasi for lynching an innocent soldier.

Some residents of Denkyira-Obuasi lynched Army Captain Maxwell Adam Mahama (now posthumously promoted to the rank of a Major) on suspicion that he was an armed robber on Monday, 29 May. His death has been widely condemned and 42 people have been arrested in connection with the lynching.

The Denkyira Traditional Council on Monday, 5 June, a week after the murder of the innocent soldier, performed some rituals to cleanse the land and appease the gods and also asked for forgiveness from Ghanaians for the heinous crime committed on their land.

But reacting to the decision to pacify the gods on the Executive Breakfast Show (EBS) on Class91.3FM on Tuesday, 6 June, Osofo Ahadzi said the chiefs and elders of Denkyira failed in preventing the crime from happening in the first place and, therefore they, together with the entire town should be killed by the gods.

He told show host Moro Awudu: “For the past one week, I’ve been saddened and I’ve been more saddened because of what took place yesterday when the Denkyira Traditional Council went to perform their rituals to cleanse the society of Denkyira-Obuasi. I had sent a text to a friend that what were they going to do? Do they want to pacify the deities after having committed the crime? Was there no chief in that community? Was there no elderly person? Don’t they have a traditional priest there? They sat down and this thing took place. … This man has been killed and now you are telling us that you are apologising? You are pleading with the deities? I say the deities should clear the whole place; there should be no life there.”

Asked if his stance did not amount to instant justice, Osofo Ahadzi was of the view that it was “true justice”.