UK visa fraud: Don’t make it a media funfair – Carlos Ahenkorah

A deputy minister of Trade and Industry, Carlos Ahenkorah has added his voice to the growing development on the barring of four Members of Parliament from the UK for indulging in what has been largely described as “visa fraud.”

The MP for Tema West noted that he was disappointed at the turn of events and criticized the manner in which the matter was being discussed in public, adding that this was not the first time a thing of this nature had occurred.

“I don’t see why this should all of a sudden come into the media and create a lot of tension as if it has not happened before,” he said.

Mr. Ahenkorah further stated that “it is a bad thing to happen. I don’t expect anybody to mislead a foreign entity here in Ghana especially looking at people in leadership positions in Ghana… but when it comes, at least you look for ways to address them. You don’t come out and make it a media funfair and let everybody speak about it when they don’t even have the facts.”

He indicated that some of the Members of Parliament at the heart of the development had managed to return their estranged members who slipped through the net.

“As I speak to you I know that some of these MPs have brought those people who managed to ’escape’, (let me use the word), back so why the need for what is happening, he queried.

The deputy Trade Minister was speaking on the sidelines of the 7th Ghana Entrepreneur and Corporate Executive Awards 2017 at the State House in Accra.

The alleged visa fraud came to the fore after the sighting of a confidential letter the British High Commission in Ghana wrote to the Speaker of Parliament, Prof. Aaron Mike Oquaye, accusing the MPs of facilitating the entry of some of their supposed relatives to the UK using their Diplomatic Passports.

The letter cited Richard Acheampong, MP for Bia East in the Western Region; Joseph Benhazin Dahah, MP for Asutifi North in the Brong Ahafo region; Johnson Kwaku Adu, MP for Ahafo Ano South West in the Ashanti Region and George Boakye, former MP for Asunafo South in the Brong Ahafo.

Meanwhile, lawyers for one of the accused, a former MP for Asunafo South constituency, George Boakye, have challenged the British High Commission to reverse the travel ban imposed on the former legislator, with the reason being that the grounds for the imposition of the ban were unfounded.