Cut all ties with S.A if afrophobia doesn’t stop - Pressure Group

A group calling itself the Economic Fighters League has asked the government to cut all ties with South Africa with immediate effect.

This is due to the inability of the South African government to deal with attacks on other African nationals in the country, leading to loss of lives and property.

In an interview with Radio Ghana, the Fighter-General of the group, Hardi Yakubu described the attacks as Afro-phobic but not xenophobic because the attacks are on African nationals.

“We have noticed that over the years fellow Africans have been butchered and chased from their homes in South Africa merely because they are Africans living in South Africa. There has been no concrete action on the part of the South African government to stem the tide of this Afrophobic acts. We are calling it Afrophobia rather than Xenophobia because Xenophobia is violence to all foreigners in a country but the kind of violence was seeing in South Africa is targeted only at African citizens”

The group also called on African countries to refrain from laws that label fellow African nationals as foreigners.

“Let's not go far, in Ghana we have the Ghana Investment Promotion Act which talks about foreigners not being eligible to engage in retail trade. Africans are part of the definition of foreigners in this law. We have seen recently in Kumasi some agitations against Nigerian traders in this regard. That is an example of laws that mitigate against African integration”.

Although he recognises that this law may defeat the purpose for which the group is calling for Ghana to cut ties with South Africa, the severity of the attacks in the southern part of the continent has made it necessary.

The attached document below is the full statement: