The President of the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference, Most Rev. Matthew Kwasi Gyamfi, has urged calm in light of increasing xenophobic tensions in South Africa and the retaliatory calls from certain Ghanaians to close South African businesses operating in Ghana.
He stated that such retaliatory measures could heighten tensions throughout the continent and jeopardise African unity and peaceful coexistence.
On Thursday, May 28, Most Rev. Gyamfi encouraged Ghanaians and Africans at large to refrain from emotional responses that target South Africans or their enterprises.
“I believe that Ghanaians who have been repatriated, and indeed all Africans, should see this as a misunderstanding by some people in South Africa and should not react by repatriating South Africans back,” he stated.
“Once you begin that, it will have a snowball effect all over Africa. We just want everybody to keep calm. Initially, people may want to act emotionally to settle scores, but that is not the proper way to handle these issues,” he added.
The Catholic Bishop emphasised the importance of peaceful coexistence among African nations, highlighting that citizens across the continent continue to live and engage in business within each other’s countries.
Most Rev. Gyamfi recognised that misunderstandings and isolated incidents may arise, but warned against allowing such occurrences to dictate the relationships among African nations.
He further lamented the unfortunate reality that Africans persist in dividing themselves along colonial boundaries established during European colonisation.
“It is very sad that Africans continue to build on the divisions created by Europeans instead of breaking away from them. We keep emphasising artificial boundaries and differences,” he lamented.
In drawing historical parallels, Most Rev. Gyamfi referred to previous tensions between Ghana and Nigeria, during which both nations expelled each other’s citizens at various times, stating that such actions resulted only in hardship and regret.
“Ghana once made the mistake of asking Nigerians to go back home, and later Nigerians also repatriated Ghanaians. I do not think the two countries will ever repeat those mistakes again because they have learned their lesson,” he said an interview monitored by The Ghana Report on Citi News.
