US Ambassador lied to Parliament – Deportee

The US Ambassador to Ghana, Robert Porter Jackson, was untruthful to Parliament when he said the 63 Ghanaians who were deported to Ghana were not manhandled, one of the deportees (name withheld) has said.

Mr Jackson, who appeared before the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament to, among others, explain circumstances surrounding the deportation, denied claims that they were maltreated.

The deportees had claimed that they were maltreated and handcuffed on the flight to Accra. Some human rights activists condemned the US for keeping the deportees in shackles on a flight to Ghana. They also criticised US officials for treating the deportees in an inhumane manner.

But Mr Jackson told the committee on Thursday June 22: “I flatly reject the idea that we treated people inhumanely. On the contrary I think we treated them as best as possible given the fact that they refused to leave the United States voluntarily.”

However, reacting to the comments by the US diplomat in an interview with Accra News’ Nana Ama Agyarko on Friday June 23, the deportee said Mr Jackson peddled falsehood to the committee.

He said: “If he said they didn’t maltreat us then he is lying because they chained us and maltreated us on the plane till we got to Accra.

“I am extremely shocked that he would be telling lies to Parliament when he was questioned. How can he lie like that?”