• She however has reservations with the allegations of tribalism made by Caleb Kudah
• She also believes the media house Caleb Kudah worked for erred in allowing the victim to tell his story after more than twenty-four hours
Veteran journalist Elizabeth Ohene has identified some lapses in the account given by Caleb Kudah who was arrested and allegedly brutalized by National Security operatives weeks back.
Madam Ohene in an article titled: “A many splendored tale” expressed disquiet with certain aspects of Caleb Kudah’s account of how he was manhandled while in custody.
In his narrations, Caleb Kudah made a tribal allegation, disclosing that at a point he had to hide his identity as an Ewe to stop the operatives from further assault.
“Then I hear Caleb veer into tribal prejudices as he narrates what must be a nightmare. He claims that during his interrogation, he is unable to admit that he is an Ewe because he just knew such an admission would worsen his already precarious situation,” she said.
She added that “as I mulled over these thoughts, it occurred to me there was something not right about the narrative.
“A few minutes before this bombshell, Caleb had recounted an encounter with an Ewe speaking officer.
“Either Caleb was terribly confused and/or traumatised by his experience at the offices of National Security 24 hours earlier or he had been carried away from reality by the tale he was spinning."
“Did he realise the enormity of what he was saying?”
Elizabeth Ohene also questioned why it took over twenty-four hours for the management the Accra-based media house to have him recount the experience he suffered.
“When I watched the Caleb Kudah interview on Citi TV, a number of things did not sit well with me. “How come that it took more than 24 hours after Caleb was released from the custody of National Security for his bosses .... to hear that he had been beaten and manhandled?
“No amount of Post Traumatic Stress can explain what we are being offered as the sequence of events whereby Caleb arrives after his release from custody, he does not tell his bosses about the ordeal he had been through, he is told to go home and rest and 24 hours later, he gives a dramatic, graphic accounting of having been kicked, slapped and generally roughed up”.
“I offer these thoughts with the clear acknowledgement that faced with such a scenario, my default instincts would be to give the benefit of the doubt to the journalist because I have experience of dealing with officialdom,” she stated.
Veteran journalist, Elizabeth Ohene