Tabloid News of Saturday, 19 January 2013
Source: The Herald
- Betting Galore On Election 2012
Apparently buoyed by his boss’s ‘winning at all costs’ mantra, one of the personal bodyguards of the 2012 defeated presidential Candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) has seen the vanishing away of his cherished motorbike and an amount of GH¢2,000 (¢20 million).
This follows the declaration of President John Mahama as the elected president of the country by Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan.
The bodyguard, Kwame Gbedze (arrowed) popularly known as Tupac, The Herald learnt, went on a bet with a friend, cocksure of Nana Addo’s victory, only to lose his bike and money after his boss lost in an election he wanted to win at all cost.
Many political watchers have said that the elections petition filed at the Supreme Court- an aspect of which comes off today in the court – was to avoid a political implosion in the NPP against the leadership of the party led by Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey and Kwadwo Owusu-Afrieyie.
They have also argued that the claim of the election being rigged and the legal tussle, ensuing was just a canny away to calm the teeming supporters of the party including party hoodlums who would want to take the law into their hands and physically molest their leaders, and subsequently vote against them at the next congress later this year.
The Kufuor bloc is said to be scheming to put up candidates against the current leadership of the party. Meanwhile, deep-throat sources close to this paper also revealed that the said bodyguard is also the one who supplies Nana Addo with certain substances.
Kwame Gbedze, who is frequently seen around the Alajo area in Accra, has never ceased to boast about his closeness to Nana Addo, the errands he runs for the defeated Presidential candidate, and how he (Nana Addo), has been very generous to him for those errands.
He has been with Nana Addo for a couple of years now and known to have been sent to training missions to make him a lethal weapon for the candidate’s use.
Considering the 2008 elections, just a mere formality, Nana Addo, went ahead to send some hoodlums to be trained as VVIP bodyguards with some of them going to the Asutuare Weapons training school belonging to the 64 Infantry Regiment of the Ghana Armed Forces. Kwame Gbedze was one of them.
Family members told The Herald that Kwame Gbedze, used to carry sophisticated weapons which could be the envy of even the Ghana Police and the Army.
During the NPP era, the said Kwame Gbedze, whose educational background is not beyond the basic level, used to accompany Nana Addo on his tours throughout the country, especially after his election as the flagbearer of the NPP.
The Herald’s information is that all Nana Addo’s bodyguards are paid from an alleged ‘Galamsey Concession’ in the Eastern Region.
Proceeds from the illegal trade are used to also fund the lavish lifestyles of the bodyguards. The coming days will see The Herald revealing how the NPP and Nana Addo funded the just ended elections.