Coronavirus: We’ll evacuate Ghanaians abroad who wish to return home – Shirley Botchway

The Minister for Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration Shirley Ayorkor Botchway says the government will be assisting citizens stranded in China and other parts of the world to return home as the world continues to battle the COVID-19 pandemic.

It can be recalled that even before Ghana recorded its first coronavirus cases, the government came under pressure to bring home Ghanaian students who were under lockdown in Wuhan, China.

Already, some 245 Ghanaians who were deported from Kuwait were allowed into the country by the government of Ghana with 35 of these returnees testing positive for COVID-19. Other citizens have also sent a distress call to the government to come to their aid.

Speaking at a farewell engagement with the outgoing Chinese ambassador to Ghana, Shi Ting Wang, Ghana’s foreign minister indicated that government will be rolling out a plan to implement the second phase of its evacuation process for Ghanaians stranded abroad due to the coronavirus pandemic

“We have a large group of Ghanaians that we are hoping to bring back who want to come back to Ghana, from China and also from other countries as well. You are doing the same thing, evacuating your nationals from here and from other countries into China. So, countries are doing evacuations and we will also be evacuating our nationals who so wish to come back home. We'll help them to come back and I know that you are being very supportive of this so that we'll be able to achieve that,” Ms Botchway said.

The minister also lauded the efforts of the outgoing ambassador in helping the government of Ghana to redress concerns of abuse of some Ghanaians and person of African descent living in China.

“Some Ghanaians got caught up in the mistreatment, so to speak, in China of Africans and you readily, quickly, as soon as I brought this to your attention made some very quick moves to ensure that this was curtailed. And so we are happy to note that today things have quietened quite a bit,” she noted.