STING

CHAPTER 1 [BROKEN SOLDIER]

Choking smoke
Rolling thunder
The forgotten soldier
Still cries for his mother
Crouching still with blood stench steaming
The forgotten soldier
Has lost all feeling

The words of Willow Moon Pearce echoed in the soul of a young lieutenant, Kofi Bekoe who was only 18 when he was recruited into the Ghana Armed Forces after his High School completion at the Koforidua Senior High Technical School in the Eastern Region of Ghana. He would subconsciously recite these words religiously each dawn the siren blew and would kiss a 1969 black and white passport photograph of his mother he hid inside his white pillowcase. He was the first biological son born to Papa Offei, a carpenter and Auntie Araba, a dressmaker who lived in Mampong, a small town on a hill in Eastern Ghana.

Bekoe was a dark averaged height man who was popularly identified by his military colleagues by a stab scar behind his left arm. He had not a peculiar passion for warfare but only fought because he had to survive. As his name Bekoe implies in English language, 'a child who came to fight', he exhibited that characteristic in almost every aspect of his young life, sometimes literally. His enrolment however into the army was a crucial decision he had to make personally as a young man in order to cater for his ill father and his younger siblings especially after the demise of their mother who died as a result of a heart attack during the birth of his younger brother.

The brutality of battle and warfare began to reshape his thoughts and as a result he gradually began to lose bits of himself, piece by piece with no peace. Although he was growing into becoming a fine soldier, the gruesome sight of his handiwork which deemed to be the very standard of his perfection and the honour to his flag stole his soul away. The military was not a place the everyday civilian perceived it to be; it had the power to change a man's life forever.

"Bekoe, 3ny3 etiri mu den, nipa ku no ka adwuma no ho, wo y3 ma y3n nyinara" [BEKOE, THIS IS NOT MALICE, KILLING GOES WITH THE JOB AND YOU DO IT ON BEHALF OF ALL OF US]

Papa Offei's warm words had its magical way of gingering Kofi Bekoe yet most days he still dreaded doing the things he did. Although he was praised by his colleagues and superiors, he never spoke about his experiences with anyone at home for he did not exactly feel the pride he was entitled to. Being in the military was financially soothing to the pocket in respect to the dollars the government credits you with after an operation and that was Bekoe's only source of motivation to keep working as a field lieutenant.

After about 8 years of service in the forces, the very aspect of the work of a soldier which is widely ignored, even by the soldiers themselves, being the fact that it affects them psychologically, began having an effect on Bekoe. After a series of interviews with his boss Major Nyavor, Bekoe was shortlisted as one of the few soldiers to receive therapy and after 16 long months, he became the only one among the 4 to be discharged from the Ghana Armed Forces. His aptitude to efficiently perform his duties began to be questioned and his boss quickly advised that he be allowed to make an early retirement in order to preserve his state of mind. Although this decision would stop the inflow of regular funding into the family, he was willing to once again be a civilian and take a new course in his life.

Bekoe returned home at the age of 25 and enrolled himself at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology to acquire a Bachelor of Science Degree in Software Engineering. His decision to take the course was fuelled by his addiction and enthusiasm for computer gadgets and per his inquisitive nature, he was bent on comprehending how these devices were programmed. He diligently completed this after 4 years of study simultaneously working as a part time elementary school teacher in Kumasi. Kofi Bekoe furthered in taking a Master's degree programme in Business Administration and by age 32, he had graduated school.

Upon his completion, he taught for another 3 years in Presbyterian Boys' Secondary School in Legon, Ghana and later worked in the Ministry of Defence for a year where he met his former Boss in the Military, Major Nyavor, now Chief of Defence Staff who pulled strings and facilitated his employment into the National Investigation Bureau [NIB].