South Africa xenophobic attack: Dr Antwi-Danso lauds for repatriation
An international relations expert, Dr Vladimir Antwi-Danso, has commended the government’s decision to repatriate Ghanaians living in South Africa, describing the move as one of the strongest ways the country can express its anger at the ongoing xenophobic attacks in South Africa.
He explained that by that action, Ghana had made it clear to South Africans that what they were doing was against civilisation.
He said diplomacy did not believe in reprisals, but rather making sure that things were corrected, adding that the strongest way Ghana could register its protest to what was happening in South Africa was through repatriation, “which we are doing or by telling it in the face of South Africa by calling its ambassador to Ghana to tell him, ‘we are not happy’.”
Speaking in a telephone interview in reaction to the xenophobic attacks on Africans, including Ghanaians living in South Africa, Dr Antwi-Danso said he was happy that so far no African country had retaliated the attacks against South Africans living in their respective territories, describing it as a sign of maturity.
He, however, expressed disappointment at the way the South African authorities were handling the matter, describing it as a ‘shame’.
“It’s a big shame that they haven’t done enough at all. It’s a big shame that a big country like this with institutions that should make sure that these things don’t happen are looking on.
“The police and other agencies are looking on as these things are happening.
That’s where the shame lies,” he said.
He said the xenophobic attacks had happened before, so he was not expecting it to be repeated in the 21st Century.
He said African countries had supported South Africa at various international levels, including the recent support they gave it when it took Israel to the International Criminal Court in connection with a similar abuse of human rights in Gaza, adding that for South Africans to now embark on such xenophobic attacks was mind-boggling and very unfortunate.
He said even though the attacks were not engineered by the government but the harsh economy that was telling on the people, there was no justification for those attacks.
Asked whether the African Union’s (AU’s) response to the attacks was strong enough, Dr Antwi-Danso said the AU as a multilateral organisation did not have the power to do what people expected it to do; for example, stopping the attacks.
He was, therefore, happy that Ghana had taken the lead in asking the AU to look at the issue and discuss it, explaining that, “when you are put on the floor at a multilateral gathering, it is very embarrassing. Once it is discussed, some decisions will be taken and the worst will be sanctions on South Africa”.
Beyond repatriation
Beyond the repatriation, Dr Antwi-Danso, who is a former Dean and Director of Academic Affairs at the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College, said Ghana and South Africa could have quiet diplomacy so that the incident did not repeat itself.
To the South African government, he advised that they should start internal reorganisation of its society so that its people were made aware that xenophobic attacks were not a good thing and also educate its people about the role Africans played in their history.
On the kind of support system that should be made available to the Ghanaian returnees, he advocated rehabilitation, job opportunities and accommodation as the first thing.
“Ghana has the experience of doing that before.
When about four million Ghanaians were sacked from Nigeria, we were able to rehabilitate them.
We also have the experience of those who were brought from Libya, so the experience is there,” he said.
Dr Antwi-Danso also touched on the democratic path Benin was towing with the recent inauguration of a new president following a peaceful voting, pointing out that he was not surprisd because democracy was a process by itself.
