Upper West: 16 ECOWAS nationals deported for entering Ghana illegally

Preliminary investigations revealed that they had all sneaked into Ghana through unapproved routes.

A routine operation at the Babile inland post in Ghana’s Upper West Region has led to the arrest of 16 ECOWAS nationals, the country’s Immigration Service said on Saturday.

They were arrested at separate locations at the enclave at about 03:22 GMT on Friday, January 29, 2021, officials said in a statement sighted by dailymailgh.com.

Preliminary investigations revealed that they had all sneaked into Ghana through unapproved routes.

They were arrested in two separate swoops by the vigilant personnel acting on a “tip-off.”

The five were on board a bus with registration number AK-867-20 bound for Greater Accra Region for farming activities.

The illegal migrants mainly from Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea and Sierra Leone, are between ages of six months and 60 years.

The press statement was issued and signed Assistant Inspector Ibn Yussif Duranah Abdul-Mumin Seidu, the Public Relations Officer of the Ghana Immigration Service in the Upper West Region.

The statement further added that “The Ghana Immigration Service of the Upper West Regional Command wishes to remind the public, especially, our ECOWAS neighbours that in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, our land borders remained closed to human traffic and as such it is illegal to attempt to enter Ghana through an unapproved route.”

Similarly, Immigration officials at the Ga inland checkpoint also in the Upper West Region have arrested five Burkinabe nationals for entering the country through unapproved routes.

They were arrested at about 11:07 GMT on Sunday, January 17, 2021.