Police arrests Volta secessionist group leaders

The Volta Regional Police Command has picked leaders of the Homeland Study Group Foundation, a secessionist group in the Volta Region for interrogation.

Mr Kormi Kudzordzi, 90, popularly known as Papa Hogbedetor, Chairman of the Group, Divine Odonkor,65, member and Martin Asiana Agbenu, 57, member, were all picked Tuesday afternoon.

Agbenu and Odonkor are in police custody but Kudzordzi was released on bail in view of his old age.

Nana Asomah Hinneh, Assistant Commissioner of Police in charge of the Volta Region told the Ghana News Agency that the three persons were arrested “for actualizing their plans of declaring independence of the Volta Region as Western Togoland.”

He said Agbenu was picked on Ghana’s Independence Day at Tokokoe, near Ho, selling “T” shirts with the inscription, “ 9th May 2017 is our day-Western Togoland.”

The “T” shirt has a map of Ghana with a portion named “State of Western Togoland” with what appears to be a flag with colours of green, red, yellow and blue.

The flag has a symbol of a handshake.

Mr Hinneh said the leaders would be charged for treason and that the case would be referred to the Attorney General for advice.

The Homeland Study Group Foundation last year intensified agitations for the declaration of Western Togoland as a sovereign state, which they claimed stretches from Kulungugu in the Upper East Region to Keta in the Southern coast.

They stated that the Gold Coast voted to be a unitary state on July 12, 1956 while the Western Togoland voted to be in union with Ghana on July 9, 1956 and that the union had not been established till now.

The group said the size of Eastern Togoland was 22,000 square miles and the Western Togoland as 12,600 square miles.

Source: GNA