Robbers kill driver on Accra-Kumasi road (PHOTOS)

A 32-year-old driver of a Man Diesel truck was Wednesday shot and killed in cold blood when his vehicle was intercepted by armed robbers on the

Three passengers, two of whom were on a VIP bus, also sustained injuries and were sent to the Nkawkaw Government Hospital for treatment.

Two of the injured were treated and discharged.

The hood-wearing armed robbers, numbering about five and suspected to be of Fulani descent, laid ambush in a nearby bush and struck as the truck approached.

They were alleged to have signalled the truck to stop and when the driver failed to heed their signal, they fired at him, hitting him in the forehead.

That resulted in the truck veering off the road into the bush.

The body of the deceased, identified as Hamida Diary, has since been deposited at the Konongo Government Hospital.

The incident occurred near the Breku Forest, about five kilometres from Dadieso, the border town between the Ashanti and Eastern regions, around 1:30 a.m.

Briefing the press at the scene of the incident, the Deputy Ashanti Regional Police Commander, Assistant Commissioner of Police Mr Osei Kweku Ampofo-Duku, said the robbers emerged from the bush and signalled the deceased to stop, but he did not heed to the order.

He said after shooting the driver, the robbers rushed onto the truck, with registration number UW 732 C and loaded with sugar and rice, to rob the occupants.

Mr Ampofo-Duku said while robbing the first truck, another truck, with registration number GN 4906-11 and driven by Bismark Adomako Yeboah, also pulled up, thinking the other truck had developed a fault.

According to the Deputy Police Commander, when the other truck pulled up, the robbers again emerged and asked the occupants to lie face down on the road and robbed them of their cash and other personal items, including mobile phones.

A Blue Bird VIP passenger bus, with registration number GM 8050-13 and travelling from Kumasi to Accra, which appeared on the scene was also attacked.

Mr Ampofo-Duku said the robbers shot the window on the driver’s side of the bus when they were unable to open it and the bullet hit two passengers in the bus who sustained injuries.

He said no arrest had been made yet but investigations indicated that the robbers came from the Eastern Region to commit the crime.

According to him, from the sound of the gunshots that the eyewitnesses described to the police and from the shells that were found on the scene, the robbers were suspected to have used a pump action gun for the operation.