General News of Monday, 7 July 2003

Source: Ghanaian Chronicle

Hawa Wins Her Legal Action

The Member of Parliament (MP) for Bawku Central, Hawa Yakubu, has had her name cleared at the Madina Ga district magistrate's court when Mrs. Aggudey the accused person took the witness stand and admitted on oath that she had talked to Juliet Achuliwor, who appeared as a witness in the case for the Bawku MP.

The accused also admitted telling the MP's witness that she (the MP) has done something against her for which she was going to retaliate a hundred fold and wage a full war against her.

On the threat on the MP's life, the accused said when Madam Yakubu landed at the air force base during the burial of the late Mr. Achuliwor, she overheard the plaintiff telling Dr. Gambilla that her security had told her that she (accused) had threatened to kill her. So when she (accused) heard that she also said: "I will kill you indeed".

The magistrate then intervened and said in the spirit of Alternative Conflict Resolution they should find a way out considering the long relationship that has existed between the two people.

At that point Madam Yakubu said that the threat was real and that people who had carried out the destruction of her house and property were people she knew for a long time. So the issue of knowing people for a long time does not absolve her from the threat.

She added: it is not just the threat but also the allegation she made in her statement that I (Hawa) had asked her not to support the NPP candidate for the Navrongo Central by-election and that she should convince the NPP candidate to step down.

This bid the plaintiff said was very unfair because most members of her party had taken the version of the accused seriously and believed it. In view of that she was going through a lot of harassment.

Then on the floor of the ECOWAS Parliament a colleague MP, from Ghana, made a statement that her loyalty to the party is in doubt. This she said is because of the negative propaganda of the accused.

Lawyers present intervened in the matter and the case was stood down for sometime for consultations with the plaintiff, and the defendant during which she agreed to apologise.

Madam Yakubu demanded a public explanation from the accused of what really happened because she wanted her name cleared with the party and also secure her safety since the threat on her life was real that is why she took it to the court. So she insisted that she made the facts known so that people would put to rest all the false allegations about her activity and herself in the party.

Mrs. Aggudey apologised by walking to her and embracing her.

Readers would recall that on March 16, this year, Madam Yakubu lodged a complaint of a renewed threat on her life at the Airport police station, a story that Chronicle broke.

Madam Yakubu was said to have been threatened by Mrs. Aggudey, on board an Airforce plane which was returning with some government officials from Navrongo after the final funeral rites of the late MP for Navrongo Central, John Achuliwor, who said, "we have waged war against her and I have taken the responsibility to kill her."

At the first sitting on April 4 the 49-year-old Mrs. Aggudey, self-employed and wife of the deputy commissioner of Customs Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS), who initially pleaded not guilty to the charges, later told the court that she indeed issued a threat on the life of Madam Yakubu and, therefore pleaded for her forgiveness.