Tema police accused of extortion

STORY: EMELIA ARYEE, INTERN, PROFESSIONAL INSTITUTE OF JOURNALISM

Taxi drivers operating in the Tema metropolis, especially Community one, have accused police officers in the area of extorting monies from them at the least offence they commit.

According to the drivers, some of the road regulations they breach include road traffic offences, parking for more than a minute at a station, which according to them; do not warrant fines or punishment, but the police officers take advantage of that to demand huge monies from them.

“Sometimes they do not find any fault with us; yet because they want to extort moneys from us they will unnecessarily point something out,” some irate drivers told TODAY over the weekend.

One of the drivers, who gave his name as Mr Samuel Mensah, recalled one of such extortion incident on Tuesday, 2nd February, 2010.

He said he had parked his taxi cab at a bus stop adjacent the Tema State Transport Corporation (STC) yard to take a letter.
“When I parked my taxi to collect my letter, it did not take me even more than ten minutes to do that. I returned to where my car was parked only to find out that my car tyres had been clamped with some device,” the taxi driver said.
He contended that he then decided to seek from a police officer who was standing by his car the offence he had committed to warrant the locking up of his car tyres.

“The charge the police man levelled against me was that I had broken a road safety regulation by parking at the bus stop.
He then prevented me from having access to my car and directed me to the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA) office to pay a fine of GH¢50.00 which comes with a receipt or GH¢20.00 fine without receipt,” Mr Mensah recounted.
He said he complied with the directive and went to the TMA office and paid a GH¢20.00 fine without receipt to the receptionist before he was allowed to take his car away.

Mr Joseph Bondzie, another driver who also fell victim to the police extortion tactics, also recalled that he was fined unlawfully for dropping a passenger and picking some others at the same bus stop.

It was in this direction that the taxi drivers called on the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Paul Tawiah Quaye, to keep eagle eyes on some of his officers who by their actions are dragging the image of the police into the mud.
The drivers also made a passionate appeal to the Ministry of Transportation and the police administration to check these policemen.