Ghanaian undercover journalist, Ahmed Husein, who helped expose corruption in international football has been shot dead in the Ghanaian capital Accra, police said Thursday.
Ahmed Husein was part of a team led by award-winning journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas, whose in-depth report on corruption in football led to the resignation of the head of the Ghana Football Association. Dozens of football referees and officials were also banned.
A police spokesperson said the journalist was shot in the neck and the chest by unknown gunmen on his way home on Wednesday night, an AFP report disclosed.
Confirming the incident, Anas tweeted: “Sad news, but we shall not be silenced. Rest in peace, Ahmed.”
Prior to his death, Husein had made a complaint to police after his pictures were published on national television.
Ghanaian journalists and Ghana’s national media regulator have since condemned the killing of the 34-year-old reporter, who was instrumental in the international football corruption investigation which broke last year and called on the police to conduct a thorough investigation.
“It will be in the national interest to arrest the perpetrators of this crime,” the commission’s chairman Yaw Boadu Ayeboafo said in a statement.
Football’s world governing body FIFA in October 2018 banned former Ghana FA boss Kwesi Nyantakyi for life and fined him nearly $500,000 after he was seen on camera accepting bribes.
Nyantakyi was accused of requesting $11 million (9.3 million euros) to secure government contracts.
Eight referees and assistant referees were banned for life while 53 other officials were subject to 10-year bans. Fourteen officials were exonerated.
The revelations rocked Ghana a country which prides itself as being a stable democracy and where football is the national sport.