Paramount Chief of the Akyem Abuakwa Traditional area, Okyeheme Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin II, has revealed that there was no ambulance to ferry ex-Vice-President Kwesi Bekoe Amissah-Arthur to the 37 Military Hospital after he collapsed at the Airforce Gym on Friday, 29 June 2018 during one of his usual workout sessions.
The Chief, who was also working out in the same gym as he’s done with the late Vice President recounted the tragic circumstance leading to the death of his gym mate of more than 14 years.
“As it’s been for 14 years, any time I go there [gym], I meet my friend and we’ll talk, shake hands … and then go to our different machines…”, he said while addressing an audience.
According to Okyehene, as he worked out on a different machine from that of the former Veep, “…I heard ‘bang’! Three women in the gym were screaming, I left my machine and went and there lay my friend trying to find some air to breathe.
“We gathered around him and pumped his heart as hard as we could, yelled out his name; his wife was calling out: ‘Jesus, save him!’ I just said: ‘Call the ambulance, let’s take him to the hospital’.
“There were about seven, eight of us, and something dawned on me: When we took him out, there was no ambulance, there was no car, we threw the former vice-president in the back of a pick-up and drove off to 37.
“At this moment, I went back to the gym and everybody had departed. The place was empty. I just went and got my towel and my phone, called my driver to take me home.
“I was waiting so anxiously on the phone to hear if somebody will call and say that he’s alright. The call came, and Boakye, the trainer in the gym said Osagyefo, he didn’t make it. The vice-president is dead”, Okyehene narrated.
