Radio Tongu Director arrested for promoting Western Togoland secessionist group

Irene Narh-Saam Jan - 16 - 2020 , 14:42 2 minutes read

The Director of Radio Tongu, Mr Bestway Zottor, has been arrested by the police for allegedly using the radio station to champion activities of the Homeland Study Foundation Group (HSFG), a group that has been agitating for the separation of the Volta Region from Ghana as an independent state, known as Western Togoland.

According to a report filed by the Ghana News Agency (GNA), Mr Zottor was picked up by security personnel at his residence in Sogakope on Wednesday, January 15, 2019.

Mr Zottor's arrest came few days after the Volta Regional Minister, Dr Archibald Letsa, cautioned the media to desist from propagating the "evil agenda of the HSFG" and categorically mentioned Radio Tongu, a radio station in the South Tongu District of the Volta Region as becoming a threat to national security.

Campaigners of the Western Togoland led by 85-year old Kormi Kudzordzi, known as Papavi Hogbedetor, on Saturday, November 16, 2019, claimed they had declared Volta Region as an independent Western Togoland state, after which some members were picked by the police.

The case is pending in court.

The Volta Regional Minister who was addressing some journalists at a press soiree on Tuesday, January 7, 2020 in Ho cautioned the staff of Radio Tongu to desist from championing the agenda of the secessionist group.

In a response to the remarks by the Regional Minister, Mr Zottor said on radio: "Why would Minister Letsa call media houses to intimidate them and unfortunately, sadly, some media professionals who are my seniors, who I look up to, were also buying into that stupidity."

According to him, journalists are not being diligent enough and are afraid of their "paying master" hence have refused to know the facts about "Western Togoland."

He added that journalists who stand by the truth and do not compromise themselves are being killed as a result.

"I am a Christian who happens to be a journalist. I go into journalism with my Christian principles and nothing will intimidate me," he said.

"Come and arrest me, come and close this place down, we shall return one day," he said.