Follow appropriate migration laws to avoid getting stranded abroad
Ghanaians have been asked to follow appropriate migration laws and procedures to avoid irregular migration which can get them stranded abroad.
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The Head of the Migration Information Bureau (MIN) of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS), Assistant Controller of Immigration, Mr Mark Asamoah-Boadi, who made that call in Accra yesterday, also warned against illegal emigration, especially to the Gulf countries, since migrants often became victims of human rights abuses on arrival in those countries.
He was speaking at a sensitisation campaign organised by the GIS, in collaboration with the Passport Office and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to educate the public on human smuggling and trafficking and the passport application process.
As part of the programme, which brought together personnel from the GIS, the Passport Office and the public, 200 passport applicants had their documents processed.
Mr Asamoah-Boadi said it was important for all prospective migrants to seek the right information about their destinations before they went there.
“The new paradigm is that many people, especially females, are so desperate to go to countries in the Gulf Region such as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia that they do not even ask questions about what they are going to do there. They are often trafficked to those countries by human traffickers, with most of them going through painful ordeals,” he said.
Human trafficking
The officer in charge of the Anti-human Smuggling and Trafficking Unit of the GIS, Mr James Hayford Boadi, said the issue of human smuggling and trafficking was a global canker that ought to be addressed through collaborative efforts by stakeholder institutions.
“Irregular migration results from the fact that people apply for visas but are not given. Some become so desperate to seek greener pastures at all cost that they are prepared to risk their lives by using crude means. So human traffickers take advantage of their ignorance to cheat them,” he said.
He said the youth ought to be equipped with the right information on the activities of migrant smugglers who lurked around to lure unsuspecting people.
Digitalised passport application
For his part, the Director of Passports at the Passports Office, Mr Alexander Grant Ntrakwah, said plans were advanced to digitalise the passport application process in order to reduce the pressure on the office.
He said there was pressure on passport officers because many people failed to patronise the regional offices but rather put pressure on the national office.
Meanwhile, a victim of illegal migration and founder of the Sahara Hustlers Association (SHA), a non-governmental organisation (NGO), Mr Eric Opoku Ware, recounted the painful ordeal he went through on the Sahara Desert on his way to Libya.
He advised prospective illegal migrants to change their mindset and go through the right procedure to acquire the right documentation to be on the safer side.