Residents around Community 20 Methodist Church in Tema had to struggle to process the fact that a landlady, Mrs. Dinah Ayemeduh, locked up her tenant’s wife and children including a three-month-old baby.

Mrs. Ayemeduh, who is also based in the United Kingdom, was said to have unlawfully detained the man’s family as a means of retrieving unpaid rent.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency in Tema, Nana Yaw Ntim, the tenant and a fashion designer, said he was out of the house that fateful day when he had a distress call from his wife around 15:45 hours that the Landlady had locked the main door to their apartment with padlocks.

“I had to stop whatever I was doing and rush to the place and truly, my wife and children had been locked up. The Landlady was outside hurling insults and threats.”

He said some neighbours came to help him break the padlocks and rescued his wife and children who were crying and shaking all over.

“My wife and children were visibly shaken and traumatized. They were drenched in sweat. My children had urinated on themselves without knowing,” he said.

According to Nana Ntim, the landlady had tormented him almost all his days as her tenant and even entered his bedroom on several occasions, pulling his drawers and messing up his room in his presence.

“Anytime I pay her rent and ask for a receipt, she would tell me not to worry because she was busy and that when she is less busy, she will give me the receipt. So I decided to write in my checkbook and in my diary the date, amount anytime I pay rent knowing that she would one day turn around and demand what she had already taken, “he said.

When the GNA contacted Mrs Anyemadu, she said she was advised to lock the family up in order to retrieve her rent.

Mrs Ayemedu who claims to be a lawyer but according to her “ it does not matter where she trained or have a professional license”, claimed that Nana Ntim owed her five thousand, three hundred Ghana Cedis.

When asked whether she knew that as a lawyer, it was unlawful to lock up a human being against his or her will, she said: “I am a Christian and I would not lie. I never went to his bedroom but I was convinced that if I did not do anything aggressive by locking them up I would not get my money.”

Mrs Ayemedu accused the Rent Control Department of bias and negligence because they had misplaced her documents.

Ghana News Agency checks at the Rent Control Department in Tema indicated that Mrs Anyemadu did not have any tenancy agreement with Nana Ntim and that she did not have any receipt to show as prove of any payment whatsoever.

Nana Ntim said he was hunting for lawyers to launch a civil court action against the woman who had put his family through such a traumatic experience.

Nana Ntim has since left the house.