Participants in a stakeholder conference on irregular and dangerous migration have drummed home the urgent need for families and society at large to readily accept members who voluntarily return home from abroad empty handed or deported.
They acknowledged that ridiculing, rejecting or stigmatizing such people compel others to stay wherever they find themselves abroad and work and live under inhuman conditions.
It is for this reason that the German government and the Ghana Union Hamburg have come up with a campaign dubbed Project Mobile to demystify what it calls the myth of a better life in Europe and encourage regular and safe migration.
The Project Mobile also seeks to expose Ghanaians to the reality about living in Europe and bridging the knowledge gap in migration information. The Team Lead and Founder of Speech Forces and Project Co-ordinator of the Myth of Better Life in Europe, Eric Asamoah Awuah told Radio Ghana that the focus of Mobile Project is reintegration of voluntary returnees or deportees who are skilled or unskilled.
He said those unskilled will be provided skills through the support of the German government and some Ghanaian institutions such as the National Youth Authority.
The Chief Executive Officer of Crime Check Foundation, Ibrahim Oppong Kwarteng said in the last three years the foundation has paid the court fines and reintegrated into society 742 prison inmates. He said the Crime Check Foundation’s introduction of the Reintegration of Migrants and Returnees Programme is achieving results.
Mr. Oppong Kwarteng recounted the chilling stories of two female returnees from the gulf countries which the foundation is reintegrating them including taking care of their medical bills. He called for intensive and extensive public education on the dangers of irregular and unsafe migration and the dehumanizing difficulties people are going through abroad.
Two returnees, Naa and Michael shared their quest for greener pastures in Germany and the contrasting conditions they found themselves while there.
Story filed by Seth Eyiah
