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President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo decreed a partial lockdown in some selected areas of the Ghana to curtail the spread of COVID-19.

The lockdown which came into effect on Monday, March 30, 2020 is to give the government an opportunity to “halt the spread of the virus, and scale-up effectively contact tracing of persons who have come into contact with infected persons, test them for the virus, and, if necessary, quarantine and isolate them for treatment, should they prove to have the virus".

Addressing the nation on the lockdown, the President asserted that only persons in the food value chain and those that provide essential services are exempt from the lockdown.

This meant that certain companies that provide essential services could be operational but they had to acquire a government pass which gives them the right to go to work without restrictions.

However, the pass is not for all the workers of the company but a limit is placed on the number that a company could take.

Workers without the pass would be turned away by security personnel empowered by the government to ensure obedience to the protocols regarding the lockdown.

Report reaching Peacefmonline.com indicate that some companies have taken undue advantage of the government pass and duplicating them to their workers which defeats the purpose of the lockdown.

With a pass, the security personnel are obliged to allow a worker to go about his or her daily essential work but not every worker in the company is supposed to work.

Speaking in an interview with Peacefmonline.com, a worried employee (name withheld) revealed that her company was given 12 passes to allow only 12 workers to be in the office while the others stay home but the company has duplicated the pass giving a lot of its employees to be working from the office.

She shared her concerns that if the lockdown is to ensure Ghanaians stay home and companies are reproducing copies of the pass themselves to deceive the security personnel, then it needs to be brought to the attention of State authorities.

She believed no person is above the laws of Ghana and so advised companies to comply with the President’s directives and ensure that their workers who are not to be around the office premises stay home to prevent Coronavirus infections.

“I am telling you that my company has duplicated the pass which was supposed to be given to only a few people. The number of pass that we got from government is 12 but could you believe that my company has replicated them and given more workers? I am a witness to what’s happening; so I am not saying something out of speculations. I believe you can use your platform to inform the government about this abuse by some companies. If our company is doing it, there are others doing it too. And I know this for a fact that some companies have duplicated the pass and this defeats the reasons why the President announced the lockdown," she stated.