Shot on duty: A Ghanaian journalist’s five-year struggle for recovery

“My daily routine now is waiting for medical appointments. I have undergone five surgeries, and I am still not okay,” Pius Asiedu recounts his ordeal, almost whispering to himself, his voice heavy with tiredness, as he stares at the ceiling of a small room in Dansoman, Accra. “I kept asking myself, when will the time come for me to be out of this bandage?”

For five years, that question has followed him everywhere — from the hospital corridors he knows too well to the crutches that dictate his pace and the uncertainty of a life interrupted.

A journalist by training and passion, his career came to an abrupt halt in 2020, not because of a lack of skill or ambition, but because of a gunshot fired while he was on duty covering the general elections — a bullet that tore through more than just his leg.

The shot left an eight-centimetre gap in his left leg bone, on the shin, and close to the ankle. After multiple surgeries, there’s still a pending procedure he can only have abroad at an estimated cost of about US$35,000 – far beyond his means.

The night that changed everything

On election night, December 7, 2020, Pius was reporting as a freelance journalist for Newswatch, a small online news outlet based in Accra. Around 2:00 a.m. on December 8, tension thickened at the Ablekuma Central collation centre at the Mataheko Police Church. Disagreements broke out between polling agents of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP) over figures on the pink sheet from Sabon Zongo. Then a gunshot sliced through the chaos.

“I ran for cover. I grabbed the closed door and tried to open it, then suddenly something swept me off my feet,” Pius recalls. “The next thing I knew, I was on the ground, and people were walking over me. I was shouting, calling for help, but nobody minded me. Everyone just wanted to escape.”

He tried to crawl away, but his left leg would not move. “That was when I knew something was terribly wrong. I didn’t even know I had been shot. I managed to drag myself outside and fell into the ballot booth. Blood was oozing from my leg. I told a military officer, who passed by, that I was dying. He said there was nothing he could do; that I should save myself.”

He lay there helpless for nearly an hour before another soldier arrived, removed his belt, and tied it around his thigh to stop the bleeding.

“After his help, I stayed there for almost three hours before some people carried me in a car to the Cocoa Clinic and called my family. While lying there, I kept thinking: if I fall asleep, will I wake up again?”

Five years of surgeries

From Cocoa Clinic to Korle Bu and finally to Ridge Hospital, Pius moved from one emergency ward to another. The bullet caused significant bone loss between his knee and ankle — too much to reconstruct.

Then came the operations. The first, involving a metal implant and nailing on December 11, 2020. A second surgery, in September 2021, introduced bone cement and additional nailing to fix broken long bones. This was done by inserting a metal rod into the bone’s hollow center, providing strong, load-sharing, and internal support for stable healing while allowing for movement.

The third, fourth, and fifth surgeries involved bone grafting and more nailing in response to an infection that threatened what remained of Pius’s left leg bone. These surgeries, aimed at saving his leg and restoring stability, took place on 27 November 2021, 9 November 2022, and 27 January 2024.

Through it all, doctors confirmed an estimated 8-centimetre bone loss in Pius’s shinbone (or tibia) — a gap that cannot be corrected with the surgical options currently available in Ghana.

Pius’s greatest fear throughout his ordeal was the risk of having his leg amputated.

“Every time a doctor walked in, I braced myself,” he says. “Nobody prepares you for the fear of not knowing if you’ll leave the hospital with all your limbs.”

The medical team has recommended a specialised bone reconstruction, which is only available abroad at a cost of about 35,000 US Dollars in countries like South Africa, Egypt or India. The procedure remains necessary for any hope of full recovery.

Without the foreign surgery, my mobility will worsen,” he says forlornly.”

In the days after the shooting, the incident made headlines. The Ghana Journalists Association visited and secured a one-time SIC Insurance package for him with an unspecified amount of money. Statements were issued. Concerns were expressed.

Then silence.

“No newsroom followed up. No institution checked on me. When I wrote letters asking for help, the responses stopped once the headlines faded,” Pius says.

Although the suspected shooter, Collins Quarcoo, a national security officer, was arrested and arraigned for prosecution, the case has stalled. Repeated adjournments have left Pius frustrated and without closure. Pius now finds himself seeking justice while struggling to survive.

Five years after the incident, he still cannot walk unaided. For someone who had always been active and independent, the sudden turn of events has been a harsh reality check, with the burden for his care left entirely on his single mother and family of limited means.

A dream turned nightmare

Pius loved radio, knew the voices of Accra’s top broadcasters, and after training at the Ghana Institute of Journalism, freelanced while completing his national service.

After the incident that changed the course of his life, he returned to try to complete national service at the Ministry of Youth and Sports on crutches, but was told to focus on his healing. He has not been able to secure a job due to his condition and has remained unemployed ever since.

Pius and his family have spent about GHC100,000 on surgeries and post-operative care with help from friends and family.

“For every surgery, you need about GHC18,000 to GHC20,000, excluding post-hospital charges,” he says.

Pius now talks less about pain and more about the cost of staying alive.

“Even people with salaries complain about hardship,” he says. “How much more someone who hasn’t worked in five years?”

With no compensation scheme for journalists injured on duty, Pius survives on sporadic acts of goodwill. A GoFundMe campaign raised just about US$400 for him.

The financial and emotional toll of Pius’s near-death experience on the family has been far-reaching. For example, his mum, once a trader, is now engaged in small-scale farming after using a big chunk of her trading capital to help pay her son’s medical bills.

The shadow that remains

Today, Pius moves slowly, his left leg held together by metals, his movements driven by sheer determination. The bullet may be gone from his crushed shin bone, but its consequences have shaped everything: lost job, limited mobility, constant medical reviews, and the fear that one misstep could undo years of surgeries and bring him to his worst fear – amputation.

“I didn’t commit a crime,” he says. “I was only doing my job.”

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Juliet Etefe is a Fellow in the 2025 Next Generation Investigative Journalism Fellowship at the Media Foundation for West Africa, funded by DW Akademie.