The Wa Naa has distanced his Palace from the public flogging of a girl and boy at the forecourt of the Palace on Tuesday afternoon.
Through his spokesperson, he has disassociated himself and condemned the floggers of persons seen in a leaked sex video.
The Ghana News Agency (GNA) reports that Naa Fuseini Seidu Pelpuo IV, the Overlord of the Wala Traditional Council speaking through his spokesperson said the act has the potential to drag the reputation of the palace into disrepute and gave the assurance that the perpetrators of the “barbaric act” would be fished out to face the full rigours of the law.
Naa Kadri Ibrahim, Jinpehi Naa, the Spokesperson of the chief, told the GNA in Wa in reaction to the incident which happened at the forecourt of the Wa Naa’s Palace.
He explained that the flogging incident happened at a time the Wa Naa was not around while he, the Spokesperson, was also in school, and added that none of the principal chiefs was also around saying, “Whoever took that decision to have them flogged has erred and must be arrested and brought to book”.
Related: Two Adolescents Receive 20 Lashes In Palace For Filming A Sextape [Video]
“The position of His Majesty, Wa Naa, and for that matter, the palace, is that that is an unfortunate incident and we condemn the act of flogging and we are going ahead to collaborate with the police to see how professionally, they will go about it. It is something that we are not for. We are not for it at all”, Na Ibrahim added.
According to him, the victims should have been reported to the law enforcement agencies for the necessary actions to be taken against them if they were deemed to have committed a crime rather than taking the law into their own hands by flogging them in public.
What happened
A girl and a boy who were seen in a leaked sex video shared on social media have been picked up by some residents and flogged publicly in Wa.
They were paraded at the forecourt of the Wa Naa’s Palace on Tuesday (May 31, 2022) and lashed by a group.
A video of the incident, which happened on Tuesday afternoon has been shared on social media.
The girl and boy had been seen having sex in a leaked video. The video had a date stamp of May 29 [Sunday]
This, did not go down well with some youth, who picked them up Tuesday, tied them to a pole at the forecourt of the Wa Naa’s Palace and flogged them.
Graphic Online understands that there was a similar video earlier on, with another young girl who was seen advertising that she was a commercial sex worker, and does hook-ups.
In the earlier video, the girl admitted she was a commercial sex worker and was available for hook-ups.
The matter was reported to the elders at Wa and they decided that, anytime they come across any of such videos, they should look for the persons behind it and bring them to the elders, since Islam frowns on such acts.
The motive, was to serve as a deterrent to other young girls and boys from engaging in such acts in Wa, according to a source who hinted Graphic Online about the incident.
So, when this new video was spotted on social media, the youth went for the girl and boy, and paraded them Tuesday afternoon.
They had sent them to the Palace to ostensibly report them to the Wa Naa, but when they got there and the Wa Naa was not around, a decision was taken to give them 100 lashes each.
But that was later reduced to 20 lashes each.
It would be recalled that a similar incident happened at Kafaba near Salaga in the Savannah Region in July 2020, where a 90-year-old woman on the accusation that she was a witch was lynched.
The incident happened on Thursday, July 23, 2020 in the East Gonja Municipality.
One of the main suspects said to have spearheaded the lynching of the 90-year-old woman was arrested by the police.
The suspect Latifah Bumaye, 33, was arrested at Kejewu Bator, a fishing community near Salaga, the capital of the East Gonja Municipality.