Seventy-two Nigerian women and a Togolese are to be deported
by the Enforcement Unit of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) for being in the
country illegally.
Most of the Nigerian deportees were also said to have
engaged in prostitution in Ghana, apart from lacking the requisite resident
permits.
They were arrested along with nine Ghanaians in a swoop at
the Redco Flats neighborhood at Madina in Accra on Thursday, September 20.
The Ghanaians are to be handed over to the Ghana Police
Service for prosecution.
Briefing newsmen during a Press Conference yesterday, Public
Affairs of the GIS, Deputy Superintendent of Immigration (DSI), Linda Asare
Mantey, at a press briefing said the swoop was based on intelligence the
service gathered.
According to her, 20 of the suspects were arrested at the
Junior Hotel at Madina whilst the rest were arrested in the same vicinity,
which is noted for prostitution activities.
She said the foreign nationals would be repatriated to their
home countries whilst the Ghanaian nationals would be handed over to the police
for further investigations and prosecution.
Illegalities.
Supt. Mantey said although eight of the foreign nationals
claimed they had passports, they could not produce any such documents,
explaining that “the GIS has requested for their travel certificates from the
Nigerian High Commission as well as the Togo Embassy to send them back to their
various countries.”
The suspects, she said, had refused to give details of their
presence in the country, including when they entered Ghana.
According to her, the suspects “have built ghettos and
kiosks where they operate,” adding that some of the suspects were arrested in the
act.
“It is illegal to come to the country and engage in
prostitution,” she said, cautioning prospective foreign nationals and Ghanaians
who engage in such practices to desist from it.
Supt. Mantey also cautioned owners and managers of hotel
facilities who hire their facilities out to irregular migrants and locals to
use for prostitution to refrain from it, saying “We will go after them.”
She gave a hint that the Enforcement Unit of GIS would
embark on similar exercises in other areas where both irregular foreign
nationals and locals engage prostitution activities.
