Beirut – July 26, Efforts to evacuate Ghanaians from Lebanon in the on-going hostilities between Lebanon and Israel are seriously on the way. Since the community was informed by the Ghana Consulate in Beirut of the government’s intention to assist its nationals by evacuating them to a safe place possibly Ghana, there has been a coordinated effort between the community and the Consulate daily around the clock to reached out to all Ghanaian nationals.

Advertisement for registration and evacuation was placed in all five major local newspapers and also some TV stations by the office of the Consulate in Beirut. Executive members of the community were also charged by the Consulate to go from house to house to people whom they cannot reach by phone in order to get the message across and register them.

The response was positive. More people rushed to the consulate to get registered. Others registered through the various church groups. This raised the number of possible evacuees to well beyond 350 (Three hundred and fifty) persons. However, this number decreased to 106 (One hundred and six) on July 24 when reconfirmation phone calls were made to get the exact number of evacuees to be giving to agencies assigned to oversee the task. Namely: The Ghana Embassy in Cairo and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) all of whom has been in daily contact with the Consulate in Beirut, and had also spoken to some members of the community.

It is now confirmed that the evacuation will take place on Thursday, July 27 at 6:00am. Points of embarkation are Joyful Road Jal-El-Dib and Tripoli at Quality Inn Rashid Karame Avenue. The evacuees will be driven by bus to the border between Lebanon and Syria under the escort of H.E. Mr. Michel Haddad, Consul of Ghana in Lebanon. H e will then hand over to their Excellencies the Ambassadors in Egypt and Saudi Arabia who have traveled to Syria to oversee and facilitate events from there until the evacuees finally depart to Ghana later in the evening.