Rt. Hon Adu-Tutu had chosen to use Maj-Gen Omari Duah especially because they were very good friends. The soldier had been two years behind him during their secondary school day’s right up to the university. He was the best person he could use in the emergency that had come up. He wondered how Rex Yamoah, with all his experience, had failed in this crucial assignment he had given him. Now, he has to reach him and Kruger and get them out of where they were before they are interrogated. He could not be sure that under interrogation, they would not crack and mention him as the real McCoy behind the plot to assassinate Vice-President Gertrude Mensah.
He had planned everything carefully after his wife, Comfort, told him Linda Marfo, the First Lady, had confided in her that her husband was planning to resign as President of Ghana before the end of the following month due to health challenges. Immediately, he saw the opportunity for him to realize his secret lifelong ambition of becoming the President of Ghana.
He had nursed that ambition for years but tried as he did, despite all his lobbying and clandestine activities since he schemed his way to become the Foreign Minister of the country, the furthest he could get to was Speaker of Parliament. And just when he had decided to give up that lifelong ambition and console himself with the position he had risen to, a door of opportunity was opened for him to at last become President of Ghana. The only person who stood in the way was Vice-President Gertrude Mensah. He had wasted no time in deciding to have her assassinated. Once she is assassinated just before the President resigns, power would automatically be handed to him. As Speaker of Parliament, he was the one mandated to act as President in the absence of the President and the Vice-President.
Nothing was going to stop him from assassinating the Vice-President. Towards this goal, he decided he had to recruit someone with a lot of security and intelligence background who was both ambitious and ruthless; and there was no better person suited for the job than his own friend, Rex Yamoah, the Deputy National Security Coordinator.
He knew Rex was ambitious. In fact, he was over ambitious. What is more, he had always nursed the idea of becoming the National Security Coordinator. Now, an opportunity had come up for him to also realize his dream.
Rex had been a friend since he entered politics. They first met at a mutual friend’s party when he, Adu-Tutu, was a Metropolitan Chief Executive while he, Rex, was a junior officer with the Special Branch, now called the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI). Over the years, they had relied on each other to climb up the ladder in their respective field of endeavour; politics for Adu-Tutu and Security and Intelligence for Rex.
Adu-Tutu found Rex a convenient tool to use for many very clandestine activates to enable him to climb the political ladder. And there was nothing Rex would not do for him. He used him to investigate people who stood in his way and the damning report he produced afterwards got his victims out of their way. And when he finally became Speaker, he managed to use his influence to get him appointed Deputy National Security Coordinator. But he desperately wanted to be the substantive Security Coordinator. So, when he decided that the Vice-Presidency must be assassinated, it was to him, Rex, he turned.
He had not found it difficult to lure him to his cause; he simply promised him the position of National Security Coordinator. And he took time to explain to him how he, Adu-Tutu would become President of Ghana and him, the National Security Coordinator if the Vice-President is assassinated.
“President Stephen Marfo is very sick. He is going to quit as President before the end of next month. When that happens, the Vice-President automatically becomes President. But what happens if the Vice-President dies before the President resigns? Power would automatically be given to the Speaker of Parliament who is the next in Command after the President and Vice-President. This means I would become the President. You and I have come a long way. We are no more friends but brothers. Once I become President, you would become the National Security Coordinator. But now we must both work for these positions.”