Diasporans Demand Full Citizenship
AUMONITOR
Ghana Mail - By Lois Beckett

The government should expedite the process of dual citizenship for members of
the Diaspora, former Minister of Tourism and Diaspora Relations Jake
Obetsebi-Lamptey said Wednesday after the launch of the Joseph Project.

Members of the Diaspora have made repeated calls for full Ghanaian citizenship
during PANAFEST festivities this week.

In an ADM interview, Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey said that those with African ancestry
should be able to obtain dual citizenship in Ghana more quickly than other
foreign nationals living in Ghana.

But Diasporans did not deserve dual citizenship just for showing up, he said.
“It should not be a trophy-that you come to Ghana once and oh, I want to be a
citizen,” he said, “It has to be because you have made a commitment.”

Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey said he did not want to see Diaspora visitors returning
home with a certificate of Ghanaian citizenship to “hang on their living room
wall.”

An aspiring NPP presidential aspirant, Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey declined to answer
any questions about what he would do about Diaspora citizenship should he be
elected president.

At present, members of the Diaspora are treated the same as other foreign
visitors to Ghana, according to Ministry of Tourism and Diaspora Chief Director
Bridget Katsriku.

In an interview Tuesday night, she said that full citizenship for Diasporans was
not under immediate consideration by the ministry.

“They have citizenship elsewhere,” Chief Director Bridget Katsriku said. “It’s
going to take a while.”

She said the ministry was considering plans that would make it easy for
Diasporans to get visas that would last 10 to 15 years, or that would remove
fees for them to renew their visas.

“Especially once they have come in one time, the subsequent ones should be
free,” Ms. Katsriku said.

She suggested the AU should decide on a joint policy about how to acknowledge
the connections Diasporans have to the continent.

At a PANAFEST ceremony Tuesday night, several Diasporans from the Untied States
demanded that the government formally acknowledge their link to the nation.

“We need to establish citizenship that’s real,” Dr. Leonard Jeffries, a PANAFEST
organizer, said in his opening speech.

Dr. Jeffries and his wife, Dr. Rosalind Jeffries, have been visiting Ghana since
the 1960s and have been enstooled as a chief and queen mother here. Other
Americans who have made lives for themselves in Ghana also testified to their
need for official recognition.

“We came at your invitation. We left our friends and our families...we have
taken everything we have and put it at your feet,” said Earna Terefe-Kassa, an
American from Michigan who now lives in Prampram.

“As you call us brothers, as you call us sisters, when are you going to restore
our African citizenship?” she asked.

As well as granting special dual citizenship to Diasporans, the government
should stop making them pay them for entry visas, PANAFEST Executive Secretary
Rabbi Kohain Halevi said in an interview Wednesday.

Americans with European roots, he pointed out, do not have to purchase visas in
order to visit Britain or other European countries.

And charging for visas is especially inappropriate in Ghana, he argued, where
government leaders have repeatedly urged their Diaspora brothers and sisters to
come home.

“A paid visa is out of the spirit of such an invitation,” Rabbi Halevi said.

He blamed financial motives for the government’s choice to make Diasporans pay
to visit their ancestral homeland.

“Our African leaders only look at the economic value of requiring visas and
don’t want to give that up,” Rabbi Halevi said.

Posted by Hakima on 08/08 at 02:27 PM

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