Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Benjamin Agordzo (Rtd) has vehemently denied allegations of plotting to overthrow the Akufo-Addo government, refuting claims that he had discussions with anyone for such purposes.
In an interview in Accra ACP Agordzo emphasized that the accusations were false and clarified his interactions with Dr. Frederick Yao Mac-Palm and other accused persons.
Agordzo clarified that he met Dr. Mac-Palm after an IDEG presentation and was introduced through a phone call as a member of an advocacy group focused on medical outreach.
“I knew Dr. Frederick Yao Mac-Palm [late Chief Executive Officer of Citadel Hospital] whom I met once, the others I had never seen or met. Even in their facts at the court, the prosecution peddled falsehood by saying that I knew Colonel Samuel Kodzo Gameli. And we had discussed the coup and then met Dr Mac-Palm, which were all false.
“It’s never true, and then they knew it was not true. First of all, we never plotted to overthrow the government. It was something I could never have done, and I will never do. I didn’t meet Dr Mac-Palm, nor did I meet him at his hospital. My first contact with Dr Mac-Palm was a WhatsApp call. Subsequently, after some WhatsApp chats, I got to know he was into medical outreach. I didn’t know him from anywhere,” he told host Umaru Sanda Amadu.
ACP Agordzo asserted that he became a member of Dr Mac-Palm’s group because of its objectives of helping the needy.
“I knew it was a credible democracy group [Take Action Ghana], that’s why I joined. I first met him [late Dr Mac-Palm] physically the following year when I wanted to make my donation. The money they said we are using to sponsor the coup. Ghana is so cheap that we can use GHC2,000 to sponsor a coup.”
Asked at which point Dr Mac-Palm told him that they should overthrow the government, he retorted, “Never, the court didn’t find that evidence and there was no evidence. And they can never have any evidence because there was nothing like that. Nobody on the pages that I was, ever said anything about overthrowing the government.”
The senior police officer also denied instigating the populace to embark on a revolution, clarifying that he only expressed his opinion on the Arab Spring.
“The truth of the matter is that we are on a platform, we have been chatting on several issues and Dr Mac-Palm asked my opinion on something [Arab Spring] and I expressed it. In Ghana, I didn’t know until then that we have retrogressed our democracy to the point that a free opinion could be criminalised.
“I expressed my opinion that the symptoms of Arab Springs are already here. The things that caused the Arab Spring are already here – unemployment, other things. And I added that we better take steps so that these things do not happen in Ghana. That was not the first time I had said this,” he insisted.
ACP Benjamin Agordzo, the late Dr. Mac Palm, and eight others were arraigned in 2021 on counts of conspiracy to commit high treason and high treason.
The High Court, however, acquitted ACP Benjamin Agordzo on January 24, 2024, while six others were convicted for counts of conspiracy to commit high treason and committing high treason.
The six convicted for plotting a coup have been sentenced to death by hanging.
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