Six Ghanaians, among them three military personnel, have been sentenced to death by hanging for their role in a coup conspiracy that unfolded three years ago.<\/p>\n
There was a heavy security deployment outside the High Court in Accra during the sentencing on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
This historic case marks Ghana’s first treason trial since 1966, the year of the overthrow of post-independence leader Kwame Nkrumah.<\/p>\n
The individuals, apprehended in 2021 while experimenting with weapons in the capital city, Accra, with an alleged intent to overthrow the government, have been sentenced following a highly publicized trial that captivated the entire nation.<\/p>\n
Among the accused is a skilled gunsmith, and despite the gravity of the charges, the group maintained their plea of not guilty throughout the proceedings.<\/p>\n
Defence lawyers said they would appeal against the ruling in the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
Three other people, including a senior police officer and two military officers, were acquitted.<\/p>\n
The court found the six guilty of high treason and conspiracy to commit high treason.<\/p>\n
The men were arrested with locally manufactured guns, improvised explosive devices and AK-47 rifles, according to court documents.<\/p>\n
State prosecutors said the group had planned to organise protests, ostensibly to topple President Nana Akufo-Addo’s government ahead of the 2020 general elections.<\/p>\n
The court said it found the evidence against the men, including intercepted communications and testimonies, compelling.<\/p>\n
Attorney General Godfred Yeboah Dame, who led the prosecution, praised the court verdict as “significant”.<\/p>\n
“The constitution of Ghana as the fundamental law of the country, which has sustained the stability of the nation, frowns seriously upon any attempt to overthrow a government ” Mr Dame said.<\/p>\n
Ghana, under democratic rule since 1992, recently abolished the death penalty for ordinary crimes through a legislative decision in the previous year. The new law replaces capital punishment with a life sentence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Six Ghanaians, among them three military personnel, have been sentenced to death by hanging for their role in a coup conspiracy that unfolded three years ago. There was a heavy security deployment outside the High Court in Accra during the sentencing on Wednesday. This historic case marks Ghana’s first treason trial since 1966, the year […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":8727,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":14,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"1","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"0","show_view_counter":"0","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"0","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"0","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"0","show_popup_post":"0","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"","hide":""},"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,27],"tags":[2032,2034,158,2033],"class_list":["post-10670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","category-west-africa","tag-accra","tag-coup-conspiracy","tag-ghana","tag-high-court-in-accra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}