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The families of eight Ghanaian generals publicly executed in 1979 are asking President John Kufuor for access to the bodies so that they can be reburied.
The men were killed during the first brief rule of former President Jerry Rawlings following hurried over-night trials.
Amongst the men was General Akwasi Afrifa, who led the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah in 1966 and became head of state for two years.
The others were members of the Supreme Military Council government of the 1970s, and included General Kutu Acheampong and General Fred Akuffo, both heads of state when that council was in power.
Ironically, it was General Acheampong who led the overthrow of the Second Republic in January 1972, and brought down the government in which President Kufuor was a deputy minister.
Guilty?
The generals' crimes were never spelt out.
One of them, Admiral Joy Amedume, was shot for allegedly using his position to take a bank loan of $20,000.
 The men were executed during President Rawlings' first regime |
They said in their petition that they had had suffered "anguish and pain over the years".
This is because after the shooting the Rawlings regime failed to show family members where their husbands and fathers were buried so they could lay wreaths for them.
Graves
There was suspicion that the generals had been buried in a mass grave, but senior prison officials say they know exactly where the graves are, and that they were buried separately.
President Kufuor has not made any comments about the petition.
However, he has pledged in several speeches since his inauguration that he wants national reconciliation with emphasis on assuaging the pain of families who suffered during the Rawlings years.
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