Akumea Kwame Dubih (with micrphone) flanked by his lieutenants
STUDENTS OF Kumasi Polytechnic have expressed fear over increasing rate of armed robbery attacks on them, appealing to the Ashanti Regional Police Command to provide adequate security within the environs of the polytechnic community.
President of the Students’ Representative Council (SRC), Akumea Kwame Dubih Blackson, said the attacks had gone a long way to impede the academic performances of majority of the students.
Speaking at a press conference in Kumasi yesterday, the student leader noted that his office had been inundated with reported cases of theft and robbery in which students lost valuable items within the last three months.
According to the SRC president, who was flanked by his executive members, some students lost property worth GH¢10,000 in about 25 different attacks, describing the development as worrisome.
He said almost all the attacks took place on the two major roads bordering the campus of the Polytechnic, making a particular reference to the gate one and four areas of the campus.
Mr. Akumea disclosed that most of the robbery cases occurred between 10:00pm and 4:00am, and gave two instances, one of which a student of the Marketing Department identified as Evans Lumor was stabbed to death by the robbers.
The SRC president said the victim, who was returning to his residence after studying overnight on February 10, 2013, came in contact with the robbers and met his untimely death after resisting to be robbed of his laptop.
He narrated that in a second episode on February 21, 2013 around 5:20am, a student of the Polytechnic, while was on his way to campus, met two men on motorbike at the Success City Academy area, who attacked and robbed him of his bag and other items.
He added that a security man of the Polytechnic, Private George Acquah, who went to the rescue of the student, had his right arm shot by the criminals.
“In our quest as the SRC to fight insecurity, we have collaborated with the Assemblyman for the Asem Electoral area to let the Asem Neighbourhood Committee provide security for students by escorting students at night to their hotels,” he disclosed.
Mr. Akumea therefore appealed to the Regional Security Council to provide the Polytechnic community with adequate security to clamp down on the activities of the miscreants in the area.
Meanwhile, the student body was also appealing to Otumfuo Osei Tutu II to quickly intervene and stop the construction of stores between the campus of the Kumasi Polytechnic and Asem School Park before things got out of hand0.
The SRC president said the development was likely to turn the academic environment into a market place someday.
In the view of the student body, inasmuch as they did not want to go on demonstration for the right thing to be done, they wanted the Asantehene to use his good office to stop the construction before his grandchildren were denied of an atmosphere conducive for learning.
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