Ghanaian security personnel have rescued an Israeli businessman who was kidnapped in Accra on 19 October, the state-owned Daily Graphic reported on Friday. It said officials of the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) secured the release of Dror Weinstein, 62, on Wednesday night.
Three of the kidnappers, Alex Sampson Ojanomare, alias Leonard, Clifford Ogheonovo Oiobe, and his younbger brother Blessing Osiobe Mulinga, all Nigerians, have been arrested.
Their Ghanaian accomplices, Felicia Baah-Wiredu, who is alleged to have lured Dror to Ghana, and Albert Koomson, are on the run. The kidnappers had demanded US$500,000 but scaled it down to US$300,000.
The National Security Coordinator, Dr. Sam Amoo-Ghartey, said although the Israeli government indicated that it would send a member of its secret service, Mossad, to assist in investigations, the operation to rescue Dror was carried out by the Ghanaian security.
He said investigations showed that Felicia, who posed as the daughter of Ghana’s late Minister of Finance, Mr. Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu, invited Dror to Ghana to help her retrieve her late father’s fortune – a classical case of advance fee fraud.
Amoo-Ghartey said Dror arrived in Ghana on 15 October and checked into a hotel, but moved into another hotel the following day.
The Israeli, who was in the company of Felicia and Koomson, whom Felicia had introduced as her brother, again changed hotels on 17 October before being kidnapped on 19 October and sent to another part of Accra, where he was left in the company of a man identified as Tony, a Nigerian.
It was while in that house that he contacted his family, the Israeli government and his business partner.
Amoo-Ghartey said the arrested kidnappers were used to negotiate the release of Dror, who was dropped off at a suburb from where he took a taxi to the Golden Tulip Hotel and was received by officials of the BNI. Panapress.
