Ghana Plays Hardball Over Xenophobia Payouts

The John Mahama administration is demanding compensation for Ghanaian-owned businesses torched or looted in South Africa’s latest wave of xenophobic attacks, and insists the remedy is non-negotiable.

As two chartered flights prepare to bring home a further 610 evacuees, Ghana’s High Commissioner Benjamin Anani Quashie told TV3’s Keynote that Accra is pursuing “every channel available” diplomatic and legal to force the Ramaphosa government to pay up.

“We are not negotiating that one,” Quashie said flatly. “We are going straight to tell them this is what we want to be done.”

The hardline posture is being led by Foreign Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, who Quashie says has assured evacuees that “not a single” legitimate business will go uncompensated. Valuations are already underway.

The evacuation effort fully funded by the government, with no contribution from South African-owned firms operating in Ghana comes ahead of a 30 May deadline issued by anti-immigrant vigilantes. The first batch of 297 Ghanaians, including children and the elderly, arrived last Wednesday on an Ethiopian Airlines charter.

But behind the diplomatic offensive lies a deeper exodus. Quashie recounted that many Ghanaian mothers have abandoned South Africa over routine discrimination including being denied birth certificates for children born in public hospitals. “They give you a notice of birth and tell you that you cannot get a South African birth certificate,” he said. “Most of them are here with kids who have nothing.”

Accra has also formally protested to the African Union and summoned Pretoria’s acting High Commissioner in Accra. A travel advisory issued 1 June warned Ghanaians to avoid non-essential travel to South Africa until further notice.

The chartered flights are expected within three to four days. The minister has instructed officials to keep registering returnees “until every Ghanaian that wants to go home is taken home”.