Officials of the Ghana Immigration Service Kotoka International Airport (KIA) Command prevented a 26-year-old woman from being forced by her family to travel to Lebanon.
The woman, whose name is being withheld, hails from the Egbazo, Nzema in the Jomoro District of the Western Region, and was spotted crying at the departure hall by an officer. She was escorted to the Immigration Fraud Unit for interrogation at KIA.
After being questioned by officers of the Fraud Unit, the woman revealed that she was recruited by one Alberta who later transferred her to another agent, whose name was given as Mina in Accra to facilitate her transportation to the Gulf state.
According to her, she was charged an amount of ¢7,500. But her family was able to raise ¢2,200 with the promise to pay the balance on her arrival.
She further disclosed that her family had warned her not to return home, should she refuse to travel to Lebanon.
Her passport revealed that she had travelled earlier to Saudi Arabia.
In a related development, six women aged between 21 and 22 who were also scheduled to travel to Lebanon on Ethiopian Airlines, were intercepted and prevented from embarking on the journey.
The girls, suspected to be trafficked, appeared younger than their purported ages in their passports.
When the girls were interviewed, they were unable to tell the purpose of the travel or their final destination. One of them finally disclosed that she was travelling outside the country to work in a shop. The girls are the Bono, Ashanti, North and the Volta regions.
Commander of the Ghana Immigration Service at KIA, (ACI) Edith Penelope Arhin, cautioned Parents to take a keen interest in the welfare of their children especially the girl child because travelling outside the country does not guarantee their future.
“Parents should beware of people who pose as travel agents with juicy proposals of taking their children abroad to better their lives. There is no better job or pastures anywhere.
“With determination and hard work they can make it here in the country. The irony of the Gulf issue is that most girls return home mentally derailed, sick or dead on arrival as harvesting of human parts is on the increase out there,” Madam Arhin added.
