Seidu Abubakar, the eighth prosecution witness in the trial of the four accused charged with kidnapping two Canadian girls, has denied that he orchestrated the abduction of the victims.
He also denied implicating the four suspects currently standing trial.
The four accused persons are Sampson Aghalor aka Romeo; 27-year-old computer engineer, Elvis Ojiyorwe; 27-year-old businessman, Jeff Omarsa, a 28-year-old Tiler (all Nigerians ) and Yusif Yakubu, a Ghanaian resident in Kumasi.
The four accused have been charged with two counts of conspiracy to wit kidnapping and kidnapping.
The court has discharged four other suspects following Attorney General’s submissions that upon further investigation and review of the case docket, it has decided to discontinue the prosecution of Seidu Abubakar aka Mba, Abdul Nasir, Safiano Abubakar and Abdul Rahman Sulemana aka Wofa.
The four accused persons were nabbed in connection with the kidnapping of two Canadians namely Ms Lauren Tilley and Ms Bailey Chitty who were in Ghana to do voluntary work but were residing in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region.
Answering questions during cross-examination by Mr Yaw Dankwah, the lawyer for two of the accused, Abubakar also denied that he asked one of the accused, Yusif Yakubu, to rent a car for the kidnapping of the Canadian girls.
The eighth prosecution witness rejected claims by Mr Dankwah that he was a member of the Delta Force and Khandarha boys who had allegedly engaged in some violent crimes.
The witness told the High Court, presided over by Mrs Justice Lydia Osei Marfo that he was the Kumasi Asante Kotoko Football Club, chief security officer.
Abubakar said he did not know what Delta Force or Khandahar Boys group stood for.
He further denied claims that some guns and a pistol were retrieved from him during his arrest in the kidnapping incident.
The witness admitted that a 9mm pistol was retrieved from his room and that he told the police that the gun belonged to a Chinese friend.
The witness also rejected Mr Dankwah’s assertion that the house in which the two Canadian girls were rescued, was under his control and that he owned the house.
He also denied that he led the police to arrest the four accused currently standing trial.
According to him, he did not know any of the accused and has never committed any crime with the accused.
Answering further questions from Mr Oliver Atsu, counsel for Sampson Agalor, the first accused, the witness said he never heard in the news that the two Canadian girls had been kidnapped.
The witness said that he was also not aware that his pictures were splashed in various dailies as the mastermind behind the kidnapping of the two.
The Canadians were kidnapped when they left a restaurant to their apartment at Ridge in Kumasi.
The kidnappers allegedly took them hostage amidst shooting and eventually went and hid them in an uncompleted building at Amoam-Achiase in the Kwabre District of the Ashanti Region.
