Journalist and pollster, Ben Ephson Jnr. says his only crime for which ex-President Rawlings has tagged him as a mercenary is his agreeing to write a ‘coup speech’ for Major Courage Quashigah, in 1991. But he believes the former President is tired from years of politics hence the claim. Speaking on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show this morning, Ben Ephson told host, Kojo Oppong-Nkrumah that Quashigah had been arrested and was being held for a coup attempt, but while in jail, the now Health Minister sought to ‘spring from jail’ and sent BNI emissaries to him asking him to write a statement he intended to read on completion of the coup. But he reported Quashigah’s activities to the authorities then. Ben Ephson said he only agreed to undertake the ‘dangerous risk’ in order for him to build credible evidence of Quashigah’s intentions, because it would have been impossible for him to convince anyone that Quashigah was planning a coup. Ben himself had earlier on 23 September, 1987, been arrested for having economic intelligence, a document he described as IMF/World Bank benchmarks now readily available on the web. He was released after five months without trial. Ben Ephson said he believes the former President must be tired for making those allegations against him because as a journalist there is no way he would be a coup plotter. “Quashigah sent BNI emissaries to me, he was then in BNI cells that he wanted to spring from jail and do like Rawlings; stage a coup, and he said I should write a coup speech for him and bury it behind my house so that on the way to Broadcasting he would pick it up and I reported him. And if by reporting, yes I may disagree with PNDC human rights policies, but there is no way as a journalist, I will be a coup plotter so I think the ex-President got things mixed up. I think he is tired. I think what actually irritated him is that I had reviewed an article in a new book, a collection of articles by Dr. Baafour Agyeman-Duah in which Dr. Agyeman-Duah seems to suggest that the ex-President …tried to play games with the Presidential run-off and I think that that really irritated the ex-President and he did that…” Author: Isaac Yeboah