The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has warned the Israeli Embassy against maltreating Ghanaian nationals.
Speaking to the media on Thursday, December 11, Mr. Ablakwa noted that Ghana will respond with equal force if any of its citizens are deported.
According to him, “If they deport ten Ghanaians, we will deport ten. If they deport twenty, we will deport twenty. If they deport fifty, we will deport fifty. We are not going to accept this.”
His comments are in response to a recent incident in which several Ghanaian travellers, including four members of a parliamentary delegation en route to Tel Aviv for an international cybersecurity conference, were detained and deported by Israel Embassy officials.
Mr. Ablakwa narrated, “We were told that the Ghanaian Embassy was uncooperative, but the facts simply do not support that. Out of the six people on the list that Israel provided, one is not even Ghanaian. He is Gabonese. Our embassy had every right to verify the identity of the individuals involved.
“One of the people listed was seriously ill, and Israeli doctors themselves advised that she should not travel until she had recovered. How can you deport someone who is unwell and needs medical attention? Another individual had already been issued a travel certificate, so there was no reason to stop their entry into Israel.”
But in their actions, Israeli officials indicated that six Ghanaians who were supposedly due for deportation failed to provide the necessary details needed by Ghana’s Embassy in Tel Aviv to issue travel certificates.
The matter adds to broader concerns surrounding deportation practices. In September, eleven West African nationals filed two ex-parte applications at the Labour Division of the High Court in Accra, challenging their alleged detention in Ghana after being deported from the United States (U.S).
The eleven individuals include Nigerians Daniel Osas Aigbosa, Ahmed Animashaun, Ifeanyi Okechukwu, and Taiwo K. Lawson; Liberian national Kalu John; Togolese nationals Zito Yao Bruno and Agouda Richarla Oukpedzo Sikiratou; Gambian national Sidiben Dawda; and Malians Toure Dianke and Boubou Gassama.
According to the applicants, they were forcibly transported to Ghana without prior notice. They allege that they were secretly moved from the U.S. detention centers between September 5 and 6 in shackles.
They want the court to temporarily stop them from being deported back to their home countries until the court decides on their case. Their submission further revealed that Ghanaian authorities allegedly confined them in a military facility.
They cited Article 14(1) of Ghana’s 1992 Constitution, which guarantees personal liberty, as well as Article 23, which protects the right to administrative justice. They are arguing that Ghana is violating international law by trying to send them back to countries where their lives or freedom could be at risk.
As a result, they have demanded that the Attorney-General, the Chief of Defence Staff, and the Comptroller-General of the Ghana Immigration Service appear before the Human Rights Division of the High Court with valid reasons. The court has fixed Tuesday, September 23, to hear the case.
In the meantime, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has disclosed that Ghana is anticipating the arrival of forty (40) West African deportees from the United States of America.
Speaking to Channel One TV on Wednesday, September 17, Mr. Ablakwa noted, “I can reveal to you that we’re expecting another 40 in the next few days. We vet them before they come.”
This revelation follows criticism from the Minority in Parliament, who accused the government of accepting 14 deportees without Parliamentary approval. Ablakwa, however, clarified that a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the U.S., which does not require Parliamentary ratification, necessitated the arrangement.
Opposition Members of Parliament (MPs) have argued that President Mahama’s deal with the U.S. was never ratified and therefore unlawful.
The Minority cited Article 75 of Ghana’s Constitution, which dictates that an international agreement must be approved by Parliament. They pointed to previous Supreme Court rulings, such as the one involving the Gitmo 2 detainees, as precedent for why executive-only agreements are unconstitutional.
“The deal should have been brought to Parliament. It’s the same President Mahama who entered into a deal for the relocation of the Gitmo 2 to Ghana. What’s in it for our beloved country, Ghana?” NPP MP for Abirem, Charles Owiredu, wrote.
The opposition also accused Mahama of hiding behind the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) protocol on free movement, describing it as misleading.
They argued that those protocols apply to voluntary travel, not forced deportations orchestrated by non-member states like the U.S.
“Accepting forced deportations orchestrated by non-ECOWAS states contradicts the spirit of regional integration protocols designed for voluntary movement,” stated the Minority Caucus on the Foreign Affairs Committee.
But the Foreign Affairs Minister has explained that the decision was driven primarily by humanitarian concerns after observing the harsh treatment of deportees abroad.
“We didn’t agree to this because we agree with President Trump’s immigration policies. We’re not doing the U.S. a favour. We’re doing our fellow Africans a favour; we’re offering them refuge, hope, and we want them to come back home and be comfortable.
“We solidarised with them when we saw those images, the arrests, the violation of their rights, and their being detained against their will. It was purely on a humanitarian basis; we did not take any financial benefits. We’re doing this because we want to continue to position Ghana as the Mecca for Africans,” Ablakwa stressed.
Responding to whether the deportees will remain in Ghana, Honourable Ablakwa said, “So the choice is theirs really. For 90 days, if they want to stay here, they can stay. But so far all of them have indicated that they want to go back after some time, and we have been facilitating that.”
At the Government Accountability Series held at the Jubilee House on Monday, September 15, Ablakwa clarified that Ghana’s agreement with the United States to accept some West African deportees was not motivated by financial or material gain.
“It is important to state that Ghana has not received any money, compensation, or any material benefit in relation to this understanding. Our decision is grounded purely on humanitarian grounds and principle,” he said.
On Wednesday, September 10, the first batch of West African nationals arrived in Ghana following their deportation from the U.S. During a media encounter at the Jubilee House, President John Dramani Mahama said that the batch consisted of 14 individuals, mostly Nigerians, along with one Gambian national.
“We were approached by the U.S. to accept third-country nationals who were being removed, and we agreed that West African nationals could be accommodated, since all our fellow West Africans do not require a visa to enter Ghana. So, if they travel from the U.S. to Accra, entry is not an issue. Bringing our West African colleagues back is therefore acceptable,” President Mahama explained.
Mahama did not explicitly detail the deal of Ghana serving as a transit hub for West African nationals deported from the U.S. A federal judge, Judge Tanya Chutkan, has expressed concern that the arrangement suggested complicity on the part of the Ghanaian government in the deportation process.
Judge Chutkan granted an emergency hearing after lawyers for the deportees argued that their clients expected to be returned to Nigeria and Gambia, and feared torture or persecution if sent home. She instructed the Trump administration to submit a report outlining measures to prevent Ghana from returning the deportees to their home countries.
According to her, concerns about their safety were not speculative but “real enough that the United States government agrees they shouldn’t be sent back to their home country.” Judge Chutkan described the arrangement as appearing to have been designed by U.S. officials “to make an end run” around legal requirements barring the government from deporting migrants to situations of danger.
The deportations, she noted, form part of President Donald Trump’s broader strategy of relocating migrants to “third countries” to expedite removals and pressure undocumented immigrants to leave the U.S.
It later emerged, following a lawsuit filed on Friday, September 12, by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Asian Americans Advancing Justice, that five of the nationals deported to Ghana had U.S. legal protections preventing deportation to their home countries. One of them, a bisexual man, was already sent to Gambia and is reportedly in hiding.
The others were held in an open-air facility managed by the Ghanaian military, which was described as having squalid conditions.
The complaint alleged that the migrants were taken from a Louisiana detention facility, shackled, and flown on a U.S. military aircraft without being told their destination. Some were reportedly restrained in straitjackets for 16 hours.
The U.S. Department of Justice, responding to Judge Chutkan’s request, argued that it no longer had custody of the migrants and therefore the court lacked authority to interfere in matters of diplomacy. They cited a Supreme Court ruling allowing deportations to third countries.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin rejected the claim that straitjackets were used during the flight, but declined to comment on allegations of circumventing immigration law.
In January 2016, President Mahama welcomed two Yemeni nationals, Mahmud Umar Muhammad Bin Atef and Khalid Muhammed Salih Al-Dhuby, who had been detained at Guantanamo Bay for about 15 years.
They were linked to Al-Qaeda activities, and their transfer to Ghana formed part of a bilateral agreement with the U.S. The Mahama government explained that the move was a humanitarian gesture and that the two men would stay in Ghana for two years.
However, the deal was never submitted to Parliament as required by the Constitution.
In June 2017, the Supreme Court ruled that the Gitmo 2 agreement was unconstitutional, ordering the government to present it to Parliament within three months or return the detainees to the U.S.
