Ablakwa and the Evacuation of the Unborn

By Jimmy Aglah

Once upon a time in the Republic of Uncommon Sense, our commitment to future generations became so impressive that we began evacuating citizens before they were born. Other countries were making plans for 2034 and 2036. We were already bringing their inhabitants home from South Africa.

For years, politicians had been accused of doing nothing for the unborn. Here, at last, was documentary evidence that the unborn had benefited from foreign policy. Somewhere, a couple yet to meet could apparently rest assured that their future child had already escaped xenophobia.

Then the Ghana High Commission in Pretoria arrived with an explanation and spoilt a perfectly good national miracle. Passport expiry dates had been entered as dates of birth in records affecting 15 evacuees. The mission accepted responsibility, supplied corrections and maintained that the people concerned were genuine passengers who had received their allowances. The Republic had rescued human beings after all; it was the spreadsheet that had travelled into the future.

A clerical error, certainly. Those who have never attached the wrong document to an email may cast the first keyboard. Nevertheless, when a public record gives a grown person several years to wait before being born, somebody should notice before the document leaves the office. The elder who inspects the cooking pot does not wait for the soup to reach the funeral before discovering that the salt container fell inside.

The underlying operation deserved better paperwork. According to government, 1,964 Ghanaians were brought home between 27 May and 4 September 2026 following xenophobic violence and intimidation in South Africa, at a reported cost of GH¢49.72 million. For families waiting anxiously for their relatives, an aircraft arriving safely was no small achievement. A person being chased by danger does not pause to compare airline legroom.

But when the passengers have reached safety and the welcome embraces are over, the accountant must also be allowed to arrive. He is an inconvenient guest, admittedly. While everybody admires the rescue photographs, he wants to know which voucher belongs to which payment. Such people can ruin a thanksgiving service with one innocent question.

The Minority says the documents leave more than GH¢16.4 million requiring explanation and wants an independent audit. Foreign Affairs Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa rejects the allegation of unaccounted funds and has presented records in defence of the expenditure. These remain disputed accounting claims, not established findings of theft. In the Republic, that distinction requires protection, because a suspicion can be arrested, tried and sentenced on morning radio before the auditor has switched on his computer.

Still, saving lives and explaining expenditure should get along quite comfortably. The farmer who carries a neighbour’s child out of a flooded river deserves gratitude. If he subsequently submits a bill for three canoes, the village may respectfully ask where the other two were parked. Appreciation does not make the village treasurer redundant.

Unfortunately, our politics has developed a wonderful arrangement under which every request for a receipt must first undergo examination for ingratitude.

Then the envelopes joined the rescue operation.

The announced package was GH¢5,000 for reintegration and GH¢500 for transport per evacuee. JoyNews reported that at least three people it contacted said they received GH¢2,000. Ablakwa disputes the underpayment claims, saying beneficiaries received two envelopes, were encouraged to verify their contents and had made no complaints to his ministry.

Two envelopes, yet such a large national conversation. Our grandparents used one envelope to summon an entire extended family to a funeral. We now require payment records, beneficiary interviews and ministerial explanations to establish the contents of two.

Surely this is a matter that records and verification can settle. Ask the people concerned, examine the acknowledgements and trace the payments. The woman who sells tomatoes knows that when the money in the drawer disagrees with the sales book, praising the beauty of the tomatoes will not reconcile the figures.

But reconciliation is a modest occupation. It produces neither a triumphant press conference nor a particularly satisfying party slogan.

The controversy has consequently acquired a longer travel itinerary. Ablakwa’s defence included a request for a special audit of evacuation exercises undertaken since 2017. Let those records be examined too. The public purse has no family head whose permission must be sought before opening an old cupboard.

What a splendid family gathering that promises to be: present officials arriving with explanations, former officials arriving with recollections, and everybody remembering precisely which cupboard contains somebody else’s difficulties.

Yet the person asked about today’s missing goat should help search today’s bush, even if he has excellent information about the neighbour’s poultry losses in 2017. Both matters can be investigated. The goat need not remain missing while a historical commission interviews the chickens.

“He who seeks equity must come with clean hands,” we are reminded. A fine maxim, although its practical application in our politics usually involves an exhaustive inspection of the opponent’s fingers. Soap is always urgently required across the aisle.

Let the standard apply all round. Those demanding scrutiny should welcome it when their own records are called. Those defending expenditure should welcome the patient checking that can establish their case. A clean account gains nothing from being surrounded by party supporters shouting that it is clean.

Meanwhile, the people rescued from danger deserve to rebuild their lives without becoming permanent exhibits in our political quarrel. Their journey home should not leave them stranded between competing press conferences.

The Republic has successfully brought its citizens back from South Africa. With the same determination, it should now bring the records into agreement.

The aircraft has landed. We cannot spend the rest of the year at the airport waiting for the arithmetic.