Agona Royal Family swears oath to get relatives buried

Some aggrieved members of the Agona Royal Family of Old Tafo in Kumasi have taken a major step towards giving the bodies of 18 members of the family a befitting royal burial.

Last week, the aggrieved members of the family swore the Great Oath of Asanteman against the Tafohene, Nana Agyen Frimpong II, to compel him to pave the way for the burial of their relatives.

Bodies in mortuaries

The bodies of 18 members of the Agona Royal Family of Old Tafo in Kumasi have been kept in the morgue for the past 13 years due to a litigation over the right of burial at the Tafo Royal Mausoleum.

The bodies are currently ‘caking’ at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, the Old Tafo Hospital and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) Hospital mortuaries, all in the Kumasi metropolis.

All efforts to get the Tafohene to reply an oath sworn by one Sarkodie, the son of Maame Kwartemaa, who is not a royal of the Old Tafo Stool, to the effect that he must not allow the burial of Nana Yaa Nsiah, the sister of the late queenmother, Nana Konadu Yiadom II, at the Tafo Royal Cemetery, have failed.

Another oath

The decision to swear the Great Oath of Asanteman against the Tafohene by the aggrieved family, therefore, is a step towards finding a solution to the 13-year-old standoff in the Royal Family.

Briefing the Daily Graphic, a principal member of the family, Nana Adwoa Mansa, who is also known as Lady Darling Tuffour, explained that Nana Tafohene, who was expected to have replied the oath, rather turned to the family to enquire from them the way forward.

She explained that the move was expected to compel the Tafohene “to do the honourable thing by replying the Great Oath of Asanteman earlier sworn by one Sarkodie, the son of Maame Kwartemaa”.

Nana Mansa was convinced that if the Tafohene replied the Great Oath of Asanteman, the Royal Family would be cleared to give their kinsmen a befitting burial at the Royal Mausoleum, explaining that until Nana Tafohene did that, the bodies would continue to remain in the mortuaries “until God knows when”.

“Our concern is to give our family members a befitting burial in the Royal Mausoleum,” she told the Daily Graphic.

Appeal for intervention

Nana Mansa further explained that recently the family had to appeal to the government, parliamentarians, the clergy, human rights activists and particularly the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, to intervene in the matter to get the Tafohene to do the right thing to enable the family to give their kinsmen a befitting burial.

Nana Mansa, whose mother and sister are among the 18 deceased family members, said she could not carry out her daily endeavours in happiness while her mother’s body had been in the morgue for more than 12 years.