I was shot during PNDC era – Boakye Agyarko

Minister-designate for Energy Boakye Agyarko has told the vetting Committee in Parliament that he was shot and almost killed in 1983 by the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC).

He said he went into exile and served as a refugee in the United States due to the incident.

"I went to the US as a political refugee and qualified as such. In a matter of two years, I was able to upgrade my status from a refugee to that of a resident permit holder. This is because I had a number of equity situations, namely; my sister could apply for me to hold a green card as well as my mother, who had become a naturalised American citizen. Throughout the period, I stayed in America on a Green card, and at no point in time did I become a citizen of the United States."

Boakye Agyarko said to the committee that, "I was employed by Management and Investment Consultants in 1980 after my national service. In June 1983, for those who will recall, there was a mutiny led by Lance Corporal Halidu Giwa. I was picked up by the Military and sent to the Airforce Station and put against the wall and shot. I almost lost my life, and through the intervention of Monsieur Le Veloire and my two sisters who are seated behind me, I was able to leave Ghana through London to France, and then settled in the United States under very difficult circumstances. So for that period, I was close to being an invalid; and I didn’t do any work.

"Even though I left officially in 1983, Management and Investment Consultants wrote to me officially saying that as at the end of 1984 I was no longer employed with them, so my employment with them ended in 1984, and the next two years I was going through a series of surgeries and recuperation," he noted.