IMMIGRATION OFFICIALS ASKED TO BE VIGILANT, FRIENDLY (Back Page)

Story: Tim Dzamboe, Aflao

THE Director of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS), Ms Elizabeth Adjei, has urged security agencies at the country’s frontiers to be innovative to enable them to contain the challenges to be faced in the massive influx of visitors expected for the Ghana 2008 tournament.
According to her, it had been estimated that more than 500,000 football fans would enter the country through the Aflao border alone.
Ms Adjei, who is a member and the head of security of the Local Organising Committee (LOC), said this during a day’s visit to the Aflao border to acquaint herself with the preparedness of immigration officials for the games.
Unfortunately, there were no banners at the Aflao border to indicate the hosting of the tournament.
She said a special manifest had been sent to Cameroun and Nigeria to enable them to assist in processing the movement of people to the tournament to avoid delay.
The format of the manifest, she explained, covered the name of the traveller, sex, nationality, passport number, contact address and the length of stay in the country.
She said six tents had been mounted at the border to cater for those covered by the manifest in order not to disrupt normal operations at the border.
She said each bus from Nigeria or anywhere in the region would carry a manifest and advised immigration officials not to insist on stamping the passports as all they needed to do was to cross-check the passengers in the bus and allow them easy entry as much as possible.
Ms Adjei advised officials of the Immigration Service and the Customs, Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS) to treat travellers to the game in a friendly manner and not to delay them unnecessarily.
She urged them to capture information on private vehicles as swiftly as possible.
The Aflao Sector Commander of CEPS, Mr Emmanuel Impraim, suggested that the border should be opened beyond 10 p.m. to enable football fans who might return to their countries to travel uninterrupted.
He said although the Ghana 2008 tournament was most welcomed, the nation would not have to overlook security issues as drug and small arm traffickers would want to use the period to operate.
The GIS Officer for Aflao, Mr E.A. Yirenkyi, who conducted the director round, expressed the hope that their Togolese counterparts would as usual collaborate with them to ensure the swift movement of visitors to the country.