4O MIN AGO
Delegations of National Association of Nigerian Traders in Ghana
(NANTS) and Nigerian Union of Traders Association, Ghana (NUTAG) on
Tuesday stormed Abuja, the nation’s capital to protest against
continuous locking of over 400 Nigerian shops in Ghana by the Ghanaian
authority.
A protest petition which was addressed to President Muhammadu Buhari
was received by Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, Senior Special Assistant to the
President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora in Abuja.
Presenting the petition, Barrister Ken Ukaoha, NANTS
President-General, lamented that the discrimination against Nigerian
traders in Ghana dated back to 2007 when they were subjected to paying
exorbitant taxes geared towards ruining their businesses.
According to him, the Ghanaian authorities passed a law which compels
all foreigners to have a minimum of $300,000 USD in 2007 and later
increased it to $1 million USD in 2018 as minimum capital to start a
business in Ghana.
He opined that Nigerian traders were specifically targeted as over
400 shops belonging to Nigerians were locked up since July 27, 2018 till
date despite their various appeals to the appropriate authorities.
Ukaoha said under ECOWAS protocol which Ghana was a signatory,
Nigerians should not be branded as foreigners but a community citizen as
long as they are carrying ECOWAS passport.
Regrettably, he said a Nigerian, Mrs Stella Upaleke, had committed
suicide, because of the huge bank debts the closure had caused her and
still in the mortuary in Ghana.
He said despite the intervention of President Muhammadu Buhari who
took up the matter with his Ghanaian counterpart, President Nana
Akufo-Addo on the sidelines of the UNGA in New York, with a promise that
the shops will be re-opened, they have remained shut down.
“The diplomatic relations between the two countries is being
threatened with this Ghana behaviour as they are playing politics with
means of livelihood of Nigerians in Ghana.
“We have over two million Ghanaians in Nigeria and Nigeria has been
treating them well. We had petitioned the National Assembly and ECOWAS
on this matter as law abiding citizen who didn’t want to take laws into
our hands’’, he said.
Corroborating, Chief Emeka Nnaji, President of NUTAG said that
Nigerian goods worth billions of dollars are being locked up with
sizeable number of it as perishable.
“We are living in palpable fear in Ghana as they are after our lives.
We were beaten and tortured in Ashante region while incredible taxes
are imposed on us in order to cripple our businesses’’, he lamented.
Dabiri-Erewa while responding on behalf of President Muhammadu Buhari
commended them for the mature way the matter was handled and assured
them of delivering the petition to the President.
Dabiri-Erewa in a statement made available to DAILY POST on Wednesday
by her Media Assistant, Abdur-Rahman Balogun, while responding, said
she was worried that despite the assurance of President Nana Akufo Addo
of Ghana to President Muhammadu Buhari that the shops will be re-opened,
and despite an instruction to reopen the shops on Sept 27, the shops
still remain closed.
She said, “Let me advise you to continue to be good ambassadors of
Nigeria despite provocation. Don’t even think about retaliation as
Ghanaians are our brothers”.
The Presidential aide, who commiserated with the family of the
deceased Nigerian trader who committed suicide, led others to observe a
minute of silence in honour of the deceased
