‘Shut door’ on travellers without documents - Woyongo

Mr Mark Woyongo, Minister of Interior, on Tuesday directed personnel of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) at the country’s borders to ‘shut the door’ against people seeking to enter the country without travelling documents.

This, he said, was because the sub-region was under serious attack by terrorists and the country could not continue to welcome travellers without documents.

Mr Woyongo gave the directive in an interaction with security personnel from the Police, Immigration, Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority and Fire Service at Akanu Joint Border Post and Aflao Border, during a familiarisation tour of the Volta region.

He said, “we cannot continue to welcome people without document into our homes; if not, we may be welcoming terrorists with open arms.”

The Minister announced that government was to procure “21st century” ammunition for personnel of GIS and that the personnel would be retrained to use sophisticated weapons.

He said the initiative was to strengthen the Service adequately to secure all entry points of the country against terrorism and called for cooperation among security services at the borders.

Mr Woyongo asked them to share information and resources and cultivate informants and vigilantes to be effective at the posts.

He tasked the Immigration staff to improve on their revenue generation for the country.

Mr Woyongo described the Police as the best in Africa, saying, irrespective of criticisms, the Service was playing its role to maintain law and order to make Ghana appealing to the rest of the world.

Mr Francis Ganyaglo, Deputy Volta Regional Minister, asked the officers to be professional on and off duty.

Mr Kofi Lawson, Ketu South District Chief Executive, said Akanu Joint Border Post was fast becoming a major entry point into the country and called for resourcing and training of personnel there.

Mr Julius Gborgla, Aflao Sector Commander of GIS said identification of border residents was a major challenge for officers there and underscored the need for biometric registration of residents along the borders.