Ghana summons top SA envoy over xenophobic attacks

Ghana has summoned South Africa's (SA) top envoy to the country over reported ‘acts of intimidation and harassment’ against its citizens and other African migrants, reports BBC News. Last week, video clips were shared online showing vigilante groups attacking and confronting people they believed were in SA illegally - in one of them they challenge a Ghanaian man over his status. Xenophobia has long been an issue in SA and has been accompanied by occasional outbursts of deadly violence. Ghanaian officials have met the man in the video to offer him support and also urged citizens living abroad to continue being ‘law-abiding’. Nigeria, too, has urged its citizens living in SA to exercise caution following reports of renewed anti-foreigner protests in parts of the country. In a statement on Friday, the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission said demonstrations in several cities, including Cape Town, Durban and East London, now known as KuGompo City, had turned violent, with incidents of looting, damage to property and injuries reported. Ghana's Foreign Affairs Ministry said its officials had also met SA’s acting high commissioner to Ghana, Thando Dalamba, and raised a formal protest over the recent ‘xenophobic incidents’ against foreigners, including its citizens. Ghana’s Foreign Affairs Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has also spoken to his South African counterpart Ronald Lamola, who promised a full investigation and expressed empathy for the victims. SA’s acting Police Minister Firoz Cachalia also condemned the acts, saying that ‘no individual or group has the authority to take the law into their own hands, irrespective of grievances or frustrations’. South Africa is home to about 2.4m migrants, just less than 4% of the population, according to official figures. However, many more are thought to be in the country unofficially.

Full BBC News report