Press Statement

Press Conference of The Mensah Sarbah hall Junior Common Room on The Alleged manhandle of Amina Haruna Addressed by Mr. Edward Tutor President of Mensah Sarbah Hall Junior Common on Wednesday, 17 July, 2012 at The Christian Reading Room at Mensah Sarbah Hall, University of Ghana, Legon

National Executive Officers of the; National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS); University Students Association of Ghana (USAG); Executive Committee Members of the Student Representative Council (SRC); Friends from the Media; Colleague Students here gathered; Ladies and Gentlemen Good Morning.

JCR President Edward Tutor in the middle

In the course of this PRESS CONFERENCE, the Student Leadership of Mensah Sarbah Hall, Students Representative Council (SRC) of University of Ghana, Legon and the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS) do not seek to justify in anyway the incident as committed. However, we want to tell Ghanaians of the injustice that has been perpetuated by the University of Ghana Management; some gender advocates, the Media and the Police Service.

The JCR of Mensah Sarbah Hall condemns in strong terms the incident that took place at Mensah Sarbah Hall Annex B on the 30^th of March, 2011 where an alleged thief was manhandled. The JCR however believes that in the pursuance of justice, further injustices should not be perpetrated and that innocent people should NOT be made to pay for the crime perpetrated by others. The Junior Common Room would also like to register the fact that right from the onset we were of the firm conviction that our colleagues were innocent but the management of the University of Ghana failed to have conducted a very thorough investigation with regards to the incident in question.

Some Student Leaders across the country

Friends from the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, the JCR is highly dissatisfied with the nature of investigations that landed our innocent colleagues in court. We will like to bring to the notice of all Ghanaians that our colleagues partook in an identification parade carried out by the Ghana Police service where the alleged thief was made to identify the culprits. The alleged thief therefore went ahead to pinpoint innocent students who were detained and paraded before court for alleged involvement in the sexual molestation.

National Executive Officers of the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), Colleague students here gathered, Friends of the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, we believe that any issues reported in the media should be informative, accurate, balance, verified and clarified. In as much as we appreciate the level of alacrity and attention shown by the media, we are immeasurably disappointed in the fallacious stories propagated by some media houses such as the Daily Guide News Paper, which published on the 10^th of May, 2011 that” There is a manhunt for four Legon students who were actively involved in the indecent act were on the run and that they have even relented from writing their semester exams”.

Friends from the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, the JCR will like to put on record that no student has been on the run and that, the alleged students mentioned to have absconded wrote their semester exams and their results are even showing boldly on the MIS WEB of the University. Good people of Ghana, this is a grievous crime. If we are committed to building a very noble country with a thriving Media presence our men and women in the business must exhibit good faith and professionalism.

We also want to state that, our respected colleagues since charged have been punctual at the court whiles the prosecution keeps on praying the court to adjourn the case and the prosecution has patronized the venture of adjournment for the past 15 months until our colleagues were discharged on the 10^th of July, 2012.

Friends of the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, the JCR sees the action of the Management of University of Ghana in the suspension of the alleged students as a wrong decision in respect of the fact that the institution failed to conduct a very fair, judicious, and thorough investigation before arriving at the culprits. The University suspended six of our colleagues for assaulting the alleged thief based on the reason that the alleged students have marred the image of the school. 

Friends of the Media, Colleague Students, Ladies and Gentlemen, the JCR believes that the University did not act in good faith in their quest to protect their image they released the students on an unfair ground.

Thankful enough that the circuit court of this country has vindicated the 13 students on grounds of want of no prosecution last week Tuesday.

National Executive Officers of NUGS, Friends of the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, we want to appeal to the Management of the University of Ghana to re-instate our suspended colleagues on the ground that, the Prosecutor and the Court of competent jurisdiction of this Republic have failed to produce evidence against our colleagues and the Circuit Court has discharged our innocent colleagues.

National Officers of NUGS; USAG, Colleague Student Leaders, Friends of the Media, Ladies and Gentleman  we will not fail to drum home the innocence of our colleagues and we want the University of Ghana Management to do the noble thing by re-instating our brothers without fail.

Friends of the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, we thank you for your presence and we hope your good faith and professionalism will be the testament of a very robust relationship between the National Student Leadership and you.