Coronavirus: Evacuation of Ghanaian students not possible - Minister (AUDIO)

The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ms Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey has stated that it will be impossible to evacuate Ghanaian students from the epidemic-stricken Wuhan in the Hubei Province in China.

She said although the government understands the situation of the students and is providing support to them, the evacuation was not possible at this point.

"I tell you that, the idea of evacuation came from us as a government. That should we evacuate our people and if we were to evacuate, how would we do it," Ms Botchwey said during a meeting with a delegation from the National Union of Ghana Students

"So we started consulting the government of China, they said that the aircraft would have to come to Wuhan. In one of the conversations even, the ambassador said if you could even find us an aircraft... we were looking but no aircraft wants to go to Wuhan," she stressed.

"The students, I totally, we totally, government totally, Mr President (Akufo-Addo) totally understands the situation in which they are but as at last week Wednesday, we felt we should let them know that evacuation is not possible at this point".

Read also: About US$250,000 spent to cater for Ghanaian students in Wuhan

Listen to the audio below;

The Minister's comments come three days after the students reiterated a plea to the government to be evacuated from Wuhan which has been plagued by the dreaded strain of coronavirus, COVID-19, which has claimed more than 2,000 lives so far.

The students in a seven-page statement to the Daily Graphic, signed by Ms Sakimatu Issaka of the School of Environmental Studies at the China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), said they had run out of essential supplies, including nose masks, food and water, as they remained confined to their rooms.

“I’m very disheartened, psychologically and emotionally unstable, and cannot focus on studies or do anything productive indoors, coupled with scarce food and health logistics. The Coronavirus does not discriminate, so neither should you. Let humanity lead. Evacuate Ghanaians in Hubei-Wuhan now!” the statement said.

The death toll

The novel coronavirus has now killed more than 2,000 people, all but six of them in mainland China.

It has infected more than 75,000 people, with over 1,000 cases outside mainland China.

About Wuhan

Wuhan is the capital of the Hubei Province in Central China, with a population of 11 million people.

It is one of the most important cities in China's development.

The city is famous for its convenient transportation system — one could travel to five continents from the Wuhan Tianhe International Airport by direct flight.

It has 1.3 million college and university students.

The 88 square-kilometre East Lake in Wuhan is the biggest in all Asia.