These places, besides being notorious for this kind of illicit trade, are noted for second-hand markets of questionable products and origins.
As a result of this phenomenon, the increase in mobile phone theft with its attendant pain visited on victims recently got to terrifying heights.
While victims were threatened at gunpoint, assaulted physically and stabbed with knives sometimes, the perpetrators of the crime were on the other hand mostly offered mob justice by being lynched.
City & Business Guide at the weekend spoke to a participant in the illegal trade at Nkrumah Circle. Alhassan Tari indicated that he receives stolen mobile phones from Finland and also brand new ones from Dubai. On a good day, he sells four and none on a bad one.
However, he does not accept phones without accompanying chargers from his suppliers.
Osei Kwaku, another trader, told this paper that he receives his supply of phones from his brother who keeps telling him he got them from Italy. “I don’t know whether they are stolen. I heard people saying the mobile phone business was a lucrative one, and so I had to jump into it,” he admitted.
The story of stolen phones however does not end here. Gangs of young boys, usually aged between 14 and 16, ride around the city on mini motorcycles – targeting people with handsets in plain sight. Usually trailing behind cars without the knowledge of the driver, they move to the passenger side, snatch the mobile phone and speed off.
In instances where the handset is not clearly visible, they would simply target people’s handbags. Philip Osei, a mobile phone retailer, told City & Business Guide that a lot of Ghanaians were just not careful about concealing their phones. “They always want to show off their handsets,” he stated adding “people would even like to go to the extent of attracting the knowledge of thieves unknowingly by screaming atop their voices when they are receiving or making calls.”
This relatively new crime has been on the police priority list in the country. In 2004, there were 209 reported cases. In 2005, the cases increased to 417.
The anti-armed robbery unit of the Ghana Police Service has taken it very seriously leading to the arrest of a lot of members of violent phone snatching gangs. Also there has been a massive push by the police to educate people on the dangers of using their phone in the street.
People are now more alert, and even those who commit such crimes are more alert, because the police are around. The move therefore by mobile phone companies in the country of installing software to block stolen phones would further help to discourage people from stealing phones.
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Stolen Phones Land In Ghana