The Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) has said that Ghana’s border security is of utmost importance because the borders serve as the first line of defense.
Highlighting the significance of safeguarding borders, the GIS said it focuses its efforts on implementing measures to counter cross-border crimes.
The GIS said these on their X platform.
Our borders’ security is of utmost importance because they serve as the first line of defense. Highlighting the significance of safeguarding borders, the Ghana Immigration Service focuses its efforts on implementing measures to counter cross-border crimes. pic.twitter.com/ZeYfYPwrNv
— Ghana Immigration Service (@Immigrationgh1) December 5, 2023
Quite recently, Deputy Director of the National Commission on Small Arms and Light Weapons, Gyebi Asante, stated that the porous nature of Ghana‘s borders is contributing to the proliferation of illegal arms in the country.
Mr. Asante stated that conflicts in neighbouring countries are resulting in weapons being pushed into the country through weak borders.
Speaking on the Ghana Tonight show on TV3 Thursday, July 27, he also noted that there are conflict entrepreneurs lurking around who are sponsoring the illegal arms.
“You see the kind of weapons our youth are using, you wonder where these weapons are coming from. You realize that, especially in the North where we have some of these conflicts, they are close to the borders and looking at how porous our borders are, that is how some of these sophisticated weapons manage to get into the country,” he said.
He added “What we realized is that these weapons are not weapons that these young guys buy themselves.
“We realized that with some of the conflict it looks like we have some conflict entrepreneurs, we have some people who are in this conflict because of some interest that they have.”
His comments came after the Police on 25th July 2023, arrested 14 suspects in connection with a clash leading to the death of two persons at Mpameso Forest near Dormaa Ahenkro in the Bono Region and retrieved the weapons from them.
The suspects were Hafiz Mohammed, Fuseini Mohammed, Abass Abukari, Alhassan Razak, Fuseini Shaibu, Addai Gyebi, Abubakari Issahaku, Seidu Sulemana, Kwabena Yeboah, Sulley Alhassan, Enoch Opoku, Ibrahim Issah, Obeng Richard and Ibrahim Adams.
According to Police investigation, they shot the two deceased persons during the clash while they were guarding a timber concession at Mpameso Forest.
A search conducted on them following their arrest led to the retrieval of eight (8) pump action guns, a cutlass and a knife.