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| The Abelenkpe branch of Marwako Fast Foods |
Like the Onaapo Singer
whose hit song did not secure him nomination(s) at the 2016 Vodafone Ghana
Music Awards, I will be totally shocked if all the headlines Marwako Fast Foods
recently made it does not find itself on the list of top ten news at the end of
the year, 2017.
Indeed, it became one of
the social media campaigns that quickly got many people talking about it as it advised
prospective customers of the said restaurant to #BoycottMarwako.
But, what was the story
behind Marwako trending on social media? Reports had it that on Sunday, February
26 2017, a worker of the Marwako Fast Foods, a lady named Evelyn Boakye, had her
face powdered with freshly blended pepper by her Lebanese supervisor.
According to Evelyn,
this was when her supervisor, Jihad Chaaban, confronted her
over how she used a blender at the Abelenkpe branch of the restaurant.
Evelyn
says Chaaban appeared behind her and shouted at her for attempting to destroy
the blender. Then, all of a sudden, Chaaban “poured the pepper I
had blended on the table and grabbed by head and rubbed my face in it,” reports
Graphic Online.
“I
tried to free myself as the pepper went into my eyes and I couldn’t stand the
burning sensation in my face; but he wouldn’t let me go,” says the traumatized
lady.
It was just after this
alleged heartbreaking news hit the news media that it stung most Ghanaians as
if bitten by a black ant. If I will not be (mis)taken for exaggeration, almost
every post I saw on Facebook after the incident touched on Marwako.
I have been to the Abelenkpe
branch of Marwako Fast Foods twice with my colleagues, Grace Hammoah Asare and
Solomon Agbozo. Our elders say that one must appreciate the duiker’s swiftness
even if it remains one’s arch enemy. Indeed, Marwako’s foods are nice.
So, when whoever that has
once patronized the place vehemently writes
on social media campaigning for people to stop buying from Marwako, then, it
tells you the extent to which Evelyn Boakye’s case has gone.
Minister of Gender,
Children and Social Protection, Otiko Afisa Djaba and Minister of Employment
and Labour Relations, Ignatius Baffour Awuah among others have subsequently
been to the Marwako Fast Foods vowing to get to the bottom of the matter.
Jihad Chaaban is before
the law court as I write this piece. On March 8, 2017, he was remanded into
police custody to reappear before the court on March 16. This has somewhat been
a ‘sleeping tablet’ for many Ghanaians who fumed of the incident.
However, I think there
is one most important person Ghanaians have let go of this Marwako saga. He is said
to be a Ghanaian supervisor at the Abelenkpe branch of Marwako Fast Foods by
name Ali.
Evelyn Boakye in an
interview with Accra based Citi TV (a subsidiary of Citi FM), few days after
her ordeal, mentions Ali in her narrations.
When the Ghanaian
supervisor heard of the incident, Ali approached Evelyn to ask her if indeed it
was true. Having heard it was true, he tells Evelyn to wait for him while he
goes to verify from the Lebanese supervisor.
Tearful Evelyn Boakye
says in that Citi TV interview that Ali, after spending six good hours just to
enquire from Jihad Chaaban about the incident, finally appears. He had a
message for Evelyn.
“Ali came to tell me
that I am not the first person that this thing has happened to me. So, do I
know what we will do? And I said what?
“[He said that] I
should take heart so we take money. Like take money from them [Lebanese
supervisors],” she painfully says.
Evelyn Boakye says she
was bold enough to have told Ali that she values her life and that she will not
compromise.
But Ali, the Ghanaian
who after his fact-finding mission from Jihad was perhaps told the truth, could
not let the love of money pass by with its handcuffs. According to Evelyn, what
came next from Ali’s mouth was so disastrous that if bottled could serve as
pesticide to kill the mosquitoes in the Odaw River.
“I told him [Ali] I
need justice and he was like you need justice? What is justice … justice …
justice?!”
When I first raised the
issue that this man called Ali must be invited by the police for questioning, I
was told I do not have evidence to warrant that. That, if Evelyn Boakye had
said that of Ali, it remains a mere allegation. Fair enough!
My question now is, which
one of Ghana’s media houses (be it print, online, broadcast or whatever) or a
single individual has evidence to the lady’s claim that she was molested by Jihad
Chaaban? Are we all not using the adjective “alleged”? So, if she is again
alleging someone had wanted her to compromise her right to live peacefully in
exchange for some notes of Cedis, must we not be worried about it too?
This is Ghana. Here,
our solutions to problems, most often, are problems in itself. Verily, was it
not in Ghana we proposed setting aside a day in every new month to clean our
gutters as a means to ensuring a cleaner society? What happens after the day of
the cleaning? We go back to fill the very gutters with filth.
Similarly, our solution
to the #BoycottMarwako that Jihad Chaaban be punished will be upside down if
Ali is not brought for interrogations. The truth is that after Jihad has been
punished, there will be many of Ali’s caliber to side with foreigners or even side
with some Ghanaian bosses to terrorize their workers.
Whereas I vehemently
condemn Jihad Chaaban’s act, I equally condemn Ali’s alleged corrupt deal.
To the #BoycottMarwako
campaigners, America’s ace investigative journalist Amy Goodman teaches us to
go to where the silence is and say something. We did say ‘something’ about Jihad
Chaaban’s act. Now, can we equally say something about the silence on Ali’s
factor?
The writer is a
broadcast journalist with 3FM 92.7. Views expressed here solely remain his
opinion and not that of his organisation.
Email: nehusthan4@yahoo.com
Twitter: @Aniwaba
