Territorial borders are supposed to define every country’s sovereignty and protect it from illicit activities and external security threats such as cross-border crime, drug and arms smuggling, human trafficking, and the spillover of conflicts in other regions.
Borders are like fences: a fence is meant to keep something out of a place or keep something in. It is called security. A fence needs an opening or a door to regulate exit and entry whenever what has been fenced out needs to be allowed in, and what has been fenced in needs to be let out.
Unfortunately, there is such a thing as a door left so wide open that it makes nonsense of the fence and compromises the security it is supposed to provide. The bottom line: borders serve no useful purpose whatsoever unless they are well secured against illegal entry.
Ghana has in recent years been attracting hordes of criminals and displaced persons from West Africa the way a lump of sugar attracts ants. Armed conflicts far and near are displacing and spilling large numbers of people across territorial borders, including ours. Some are armed, former combatants.
International Humanitarian Law places an obligation on all nations to open their territorial borders to people fleeing war, but it makes sense to be prudent in deciding who may need to be kept out of our territorial borders for reasons of security.
Recent security and immigration-related developments in the sub-region make it necessary to adequately equip the Immigration Service and other border security agencies to be able to exercise maximum control of Ghana’s territorial fences.
While we cannot shut out legal immigrants, tourists, and visitors, we need to be able to establish at all times who is entering the country legally and who is not.
In the wake of the ever-growing security threats across the sub-region, we urge the Immigration Service to strengthen measures and procedures for establishing the identities and immigration status of all foreigners entering Ghana.
As part of these measures, the Ghana Immigration Service needs to ensure that hotels and other facilities in the hospitality industry that violate laws on hotel services to foreign guests who check into the facilities are sanctioned. Our reports from our inquiries suggest that although hotels in the country are required by law to submit to the GIS weekly details on foreigners who check into the facilities, they do not comply with the requirements of the law. The Immigration Service must be resolute in enforcing the law, and managers of hotels should be prevailed upon to cooperate with the Service in promoting public safety and security in an era of constant security threats.
I am very much interested thank you
Would like to read a lot from your articles and newsletters
I am also with a the view that Ghana needs new counter -terrorism Act to tackle radicalized youth.