The government has announced detailed plans for the state funeral of the victims of the August 6 military helicopter crash, which will be held on Friday, August 15.
Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, August 14, Deputy Chief of Staff in charge of Operations, Stan Dogbey, said the ceremony will be primarily a military service led by the Ghana Armed Forces(GAF) and divided into three main parts.
“The service would largely be a military service, it would be conducted by the Ghana Armed Forces and there will be three parts to the funeral programme. We would have the three burial service during which period some tributes would be read, we would have Qu’ran recitations during that period.
And the second part would be the main funerals and burial service. The pre-burial will start from 7:30am and would continue to 9:00am. We expect the Vice President to arrive at the funeral grounds at 8:50am in the morning and that will be followed by the President at 9:00am where the state service will begin.
The service is programmed to last for approximately three hours during which period we would take the biographies of the departed eight, colleagues, parents, siblings. After the biography we will take tributes from the widows, and then also tributes from the children.
There will be other tributes that would be read by some senior government officials. All institutional tributes, tributes from the various institutions that our departed comrades worked with or associated with will be read during the pre-burial period before 9:00am,” he said.
Mr Dogbey added that after the state service, the bodies of the six victims yet to be buried would be taken to the military cemetery at Tse Addo for interment.
“After the service, the bodies of the six that are yet to be buried would be conveyed to the military cemetery at Tse Addo for burial. And there as well, the GAF together with the churches of the six departed comrades will take charge of the burial ceremony at the military cemetery,” he explained.
The Deputy Chief of Staff noted that measures were in place to ensure a solemn and orderly event, given the large number of people expected to attend.
“Because of the rather large number of people that will be expected tomorrow, a number of measures have been taken to ensure that we have a very solemn ceremony. So for the media that is here, you would have seen the ongoing set up. We are trying our best to provide as many chairs as we can to accommodate the thousands of people that we expect to join the various families and the government officials here for the service.
We are going to label the various canopies appropriately to accommodate those who will be coming. We entreat the public who would want to join us for the service to arrive early and collaborate with the protocol and security officials on ground to assist them to sit. We do not expect people to be crisscrossing the inner perimeter before and during the service. The inner perimeter is going to be locked out to mourners and the mourners are expected to remain under the canopies for the service. When you come in later today or early tomorrow morning, you would notice the labelling that will be on the various canopies indicating where people are supposed to sit.”
He said security would be heavily deployed to ensure the safety of mourners.
“There will be a heavy security deployment obviously not because the president and the vice president are here but also for the safety of all mourners that are going to be here. We therefore entreat mourning public to collaborate with the security officers as you relate to their walking in, their parking and others.
If you are driving in, you will be required to alight at a specific point and walk into the mourning zone and your vehicle can be parked at a designated car park. If you are driving yourself, then you would have to go and park and come and walk into the service area.”
Mr Dogbey also revealed plans for transporting mourners to the cemetery.
“For the cemetery, arrangements have been made to provide buses to convey the families that would be heading to the military cemetery. The idea is to reduce the traffic en route to the cemetery and also manage the traffic at the cemetery. And so buses will be provided to the six families and a few others who would be able to join will join.”
On media arrangements, he confirmed that accreditation had been issued only to certain journalists.
“With relation to the media, I believe that a statement was issued earlier by the minister of state for government communication on arrangements that have been made for this service. And media houses and journalists were required to apply for accreditation.
“Media houses and journalists that applied and have been accordingly accredited are the only ones that will be allowed in the inner perimeter, which is designated as the special media zone for the service. And that accreditation is for only camera holders, video camera holders, and photographers; they are the only ones going to be allowed in the inner perimeter. Reporters and others are not going to be in the perimeter.”
Meanwhile, the burial ceremony of the two Muslim victims of the crash, former Minister for Environment Dr Ibrahim Muhammed Murtala, and former Acting Deputy National Security Coordinator, Alhaji Muniru Limuna Mohammed, was held at the Forecourt of the State House on Sunday, August 10.
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