SA Evacuation: Minority Disputes Okudzeto’s Records

The Deputy Ranking Member of Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Nana Asafo-Agyei Ayeh, has accused the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of allegedly manipulating records relating to the evacuation of 1,964 Ghanaians from South Africa, following discrepancies identified in documents released to the public.

According to the Bosome Freho Member of Parliament (MP), the Ministry has introduced new documents that differ from those originally supplied under the Right to Information (RTI) process, raising suspicions that officials are attempting to reconcile inconsistencies in the evacuation records.

The allegation comes barely days after Foreign Affairs Minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, appeared on Joy FM’s current affairs programme, Newsfile, over the weekend to defend the government’s handling of the evacuation exercise and presented documents intended to account for the expenditure.

Minister for Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa

The Foreign Minister rejected the allegations of financial impropriety surrounding the evacuation, insisting that the Ministry had sufficient documentation to account for the exercise.

He disclosed that the evacuation of 1,964 Ghanaians between May 27 and September 4, 2026, cost approximately GH¢49.7 million.

He said the government contributed about GH¢33 million, while Engineers and Planners donated GH¢16 million.

According to him, the Ministry submitted flight manifests, boarding passes, airline receipts, reintegration allowance sign-off sheets and transportation payment records to Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee.

He maintained that every evacuee, including children, received GH¢5,000 as a reintegration allowance and GH¢500 for transportation.

“There are no ghosts anywhere. Real human beings,” the Minister declared, dismissing suggestions that the evacuation figures had been inflated.

Mr Ablakwa also disclosed that he had requested the Auditor-General to conduct an independent audit of the South African evacuation and other evacuation exercises undertaken since 2017.

But speaking on JoyNews, Mr Asafo-Agyei challenged the authenticity of some documents presented by the Minister, particularly those relating to the GH¢5,000 reintegration allowance reportedly paid to each evacuee.

MP Questions New Documents

The MP explained that the original documents released by the Ministry followed a consistent format, capturing the surname, first name, middle name, date of birth, gender, passport details, contact number, amount received and signature of each beneficiary.

However, he alleged that documents displayed during Mr Ablakwa’s presentation on Saturday did not follow the same format.

According to him, the differences raise questions about when the additional documents were prepared and why they were not included in the original records.

“Now look at this document the Minister presented on Saturday, I think it is on his slide number 50 something, to show reintegration fee,” he stated.

He maintained that the documents presented by the Minister differed from those previously released to individuals who had requested information about the evacuation.

The MP alleged that the newly presented documents were introduced after discrepancies had been identified in the original records.

“This tells you that the Ministry is now fixing the figures, they are now writing up the figures, to make it up, and this is criminal,” he alleged.

He argued that it was unacceptable for a public institution to release documents under the RTI process and subsequently introduce different records after questions had been raised about their accuracy.

The MP, however, did not establish during the interview that the differences resulted from deliberate falsification rather than the use of different administrative records.

High Commission Admits Errors

Meanwhile, the Ghana High Commission in Pretoria has issued a statement explaining that records relating to 15 of the 1,964 evacuated Ghanaians contained clerical errors.

In the statement, which was in response to a JoyNews data analysis, the High Commission explained that some dates initially interpreted as dates of birth were actually passport expiry dates.

It attributed the discrepancies to possible transcription errors by officials handling passport information during the evacuation.

The mission maintained that the errors did not invalidate the identities of the affected individuals or establish that allowances had been wrongly paid.

It subsequently provided corrected personal details for the 15 individuals, insisting that all evacuees had undergone the necessary identification and departure procedures.

The High Commission also clarified that a six-member family, comprising a mother and her five children, travelled on Emergency Travel Certificates.

Although the mission accepted responsibility for the clerical errors, it defended the evacuation exercise and urged the media to verify discrepancies with the appropriate authorities.

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