Eight Ghanaians face execution in Libya

Unless divinity intervenes, eight Ghanaian nationals who were convicted of murder in 2008, under bizarre circumstances in Libya and currently languishing in jail at the Kofiya Rehabilitation facility in Benghazi - a major city in Libya - will have to say their final prayers, for they are billed to come face-to-face with the icy hands of death by firing squad any time soon.

Information reaching The New Crusading Guide indicates that the eight, Kofi Boateng; Alhaji Suleman Mohammed; Mustapha Mohammed; Kofi Nti,33; Kojo Money; Kwabena Kankam, 47 (also known in Ghana as Mustapha Mohammed Abubakar) and Stanley Nai, have been on death row over a crime their lawyers do not mince words in professing their innocence.

This paper gathered that the death row inmates in 2008 were hired by a Libyan to plaster a building he had been contracted to construct. After they had finished with the plastering, sources say, the Libyan refused to pay them their wages and this generated a scuffle between the Ghanaians and the Libyan.

A few days after, the police in Libya rounded the eight up over the reported death of the Libyan they had brash-ups with and had since been dumped in jail after they were convicted of the crime they pleaded not guilty of.

The New Crusading Guide has gathered that the eight Ghanaian nationals were supposed to have been executed on March 1, 2010, but divinity smiled on them. The eight are therefore pleading with government and civil society organizations including churches, to come to their aid.

Ghanaian residents in Libya think that government still has more work to do else the Libyans would kill them as and when they wished.

Mr. Jeff Ashitey, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Africa Migration and Research Foundation, told this paper that the eight Ghanaians really need help from the government for them to be released to come back home.

According to him, the situation in which the young men are is very appalling, noting that most of them were working for some Libyans but after the hard labour, they (Libyans) often cheat these young Ghanaians and eventually engage them in quarrels.