<<Print>>

The UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, together with the Ghana Refugee Board (GRB) has organized a dialogue on the Burkinabe asylum seeker situation in Ghana to take stock of the evolving situation.

Regional Min­isters, Stephen Yakubu and Dr. Hafiz Bin Salih, gave updates on the humanitarian situation at a high-level consultative dialogue in Accra.

To them the number of Burkinabes who fled their country to seek asylum in Ghana have reportedly  reduced from more than 4000 to 1000 due to their gradual and voluntary return to their home country.

Some of them are shuffling between their home countries and communities in the Upper East and Upper West of Ghana where they have lived since coups and terrorist attacks in their country displaced them.

About the situation in the Upper East, Dr Salih said, on December 5 last year, the Chetu community in the Lambussie and Sissala West districts received a total of 3148 displaced people, 222 Ghanaian nationals who had settled in Burki­na Faso.

Although the departure of the majority of the asylum seekers had restored calm, Dr Salih said concerns in the Sissala area were the pressure on social amenities and fear of terrorist groups infiltrating the territories within the Region.

“There is a possibility of the return of people of concern if the situation in Burkina Faso persists,” he said.

In the Upper East, Dr Yakubu said the Region hosted 6,620 Burkinabes but many have left, leaving 1,064. 

He called on the GRB to grant them refugee status to enable them access more bene­fits from Ghana.


The Minister for Interi­or, Ambrose Dery, in a speech read on his behalf by the Chief Director of the Ministry, Adelaide Annor-Kumi, said the GRB had registered about 1000 of the asy­lum seekers.

He urged the Refugee Board and UNHCR to ensure that appro­priate interventions are made for the Burkinabes to ameliorate the situation of their Ghanaian hosts and maintain harmony between the two groups of people.

He urged stakeholders to ensure that extremists do not infiltrate the asylum system to threaten national security.

The Board Chairman of the GRB, Prof. Ken Attafuah, called for cooperation between national and international agencies on the situ­ation by finding a balance between the sovereign interests of Ghana and the fundamental human rights of the asylum seekers and refugees.

The UNHCR Country Rep­resentative, Esther Kiragu, said as the situation in Burkina Faso where there are about 1.8 million internally displaced people keeps wors­ening, there is the possibility that more people would seek asylum in Ghana.

Commending Ghana for her hospitality, she said, more hospitality will be needed stressing hosting refugees is an obligation due to international conventions and domestic laws.

The UN Resident Coordinator, Charles Abani, said the UN would support efforts to manage the humanitarian situation.

Attended by institutions like the National Disaster Management Organisation, Social Welfare and Security Agencies, the participants would produce a contingency plan to address the situation.