President John Mahama
President John Mahama has assured his Nigerian counterpart President Ahmed Tinubu that Nigerians in Ghana are safe, and that there would not be mass deportation of nationals of the sister country.
This was revealed by Ms. Bianca Odumegwu Ojukwu, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs when she met a cross section of Nigerians at the Nigerian High Commission in Accra last Thursday.
The delegation was in the country at the behest of President Tinubu following viral social media posts about alleged xenophobic conduct against Nigerians by Ghanaians.
The delegation also met with the Foreign Affairs Minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, to discuss the subject.
Ms. Ojukwu told the Nigerian community made up of Igbos, Yorubas and Hausas about how their compatriots feel about the social media posts, which create the impression of xenophobic traits against Nigerians by their Ghanaian hosts.
“Nigerians at home are worried about their compatriots in Ghana. I know of a parent who has decided to have his two children residing in Ghana to return home as a result of the impression being created on social media,” she said.
She called on her compatriots to be law-abiding and to avoid tendencies which would incur the ire of their hosts.
Ghanaians, she noted, are hospitable, adding that “this is the birthplace of Akwaaba.”
Nigerians, she observed, are generally good people, but being a populous nation it would naturally have bad nuts.
She recalled how some Nigerians were arrested for engaging in illicit yahoo frauds and the federal government had to intervene to have them repatriated back to Nigeria.
“We are here on a critical assignment. We are here to find solutions which face us as Nigerians. We are here as emissaries of President Ahmed Tinubu who is concerned about the lives and properties of Nigerians living in Ghana,” she stated.
She made reference about a viral video relating to how Nigerians are being threatened by their Ghanaian hosts and threats to have them deported.
“The mood in Nigeria is not good. Some parents want their children to return home. We were told that when we arrive and are in our hotels, we should not go out,” she added.
She recalled the “Ghana Must Go” brouhaha of the 80s and, earlier, the Aliens Compliance Order of the Busia regime.
Nigeria hosts over three million Ghanaians, she said.
She mentioned how social media can be used for good or bad reasons to underscore the panic this has caused.
“Our diaspora constitutes a critical element of our foreign policy. We do not want the xenophobia of South Africa on Nigerians replicated in Ghana,” she stated.
The Acting Nigerian High Commissioner in Ghana had earlier given a brief background to what informed the dispatch of the team from Nigeria. There was a viral video, he recalled, about some Ghanaians asking that Nigerians be deported from the country. This, he said, informed the decision of the federal government to dispatch the delegation to come and study firsthand about the situation.
He was full of praise for the Nigerian community in Ghana, who he said he depended upon when he faced consular challenges at the High Commission.
He urged his compatriots living in Ghana to be good ambassadors of Nigeria since, as he put it, they are all envoys of their country.
A recent posturing by a certain Igbo businessman, Chukwudi Jude Ihenetu, presenting himself as a King of his ethnic grouping in Ghana with an intention to establish an Igbo Kingdom here incurred the wrath of many Ghanaians, who took to social media condemning the man’s posturing.
This is the origin of the threat to the good neighbourliness that has existed between the Nigerian community and their Ghanaian hosts.
Earlier, an Igbo grouping in Ghana dissociated itself from the businessman’s posturing.
The subject came up during the town hall meeting with the visiting delegation.
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