Minority wants Ablakwa out over evacuation payments. What JoyNews found, and what it didn't

The Minority in Parliament has called on Foreign Affairs Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa to resign over payments made during the evacuation of 1,964 Ghanaians from South Africa, which cost ₵49.72 million.

At a press conference in Parliament on Tuesday, 27 October, Ranking Member on Foreign Affairs Samuel Abu Jinapor said the minister should resign under section 2.1(j) of the 2025 Code of Conduct for Political Appointees. If he does not, the Minority says President Mahama should terminate his appointment under Article 81(a). If neither happens, it will consider a vote of censure under Article 82. It also repeated its call for an audit by an internationally reputable firm.

On Joy 99.7 FM the same evening, Mr Jinapor said the spending "smacks of a grand scheme of corruption to siphon public funds." On 17 October, on JoyNews' Newsfile, he had said the Minority had "not accused the minister of wrongdoing." Asked about the change, he said he stood by his earlier remarks and that revelations since then, including JoyNews' own investigation, had moved the Minority's position.

What JoyNews Research found

JoyNews Research reviewed the payment sheets the ministry released. Its head of research, Isaac Kofi Adjei, said on 26 October that the team could count a minimum of 1,842 unique people who signed, below the 1,964 the ministry gives.

The team found 45 evacuees listed in two different batches with the same name, passport number and phone number but different signatures. Evacuees shown both signatures told JoyNews one of them was not theirs. One mother said she and her three boys received ₵2,000 in total, where the stated package would have been ₵22,000. Some evacuees said they got the ₵5,000 resettlement allowance but not the ₵500 for transport. JoyNews said it could not trace more than 100 people on the list.

JoyNews described its findings as "a big question mark" over the allowance totals. It did not allege a scheme.

The other side

Speaking to Ghanaians in Ottawa, Mr Ablakwa said "everybody on that list of 1,964, including minors" received the package. He said the ministry had received no complaint in more than four months, and that he did not hand out the money himself.

At a press conference in Accra on 26 October, a group of returnees said they opened and counted their envelopes at the airport, and that some members had received calls asking them to speak against the government. Mr Jinapor said the Minority did not engage, pay or convince anyone. The callers have not been named.

The scale

On JoyNews' own figures, the allowance money in question so far runs to hundreds of thousands of cedis. The 100-plus untraced names come to about ₵550,000 at ₵5,500 each. That is well short of the ₵16.4 million the Minority has cited since mid-October. Much of the rest of that figure relates to charter invoices, which have still not been published even though the NPP's seven-day deadline passed on 25 October.

The censure arithmetic

A vote of censure needs two-thirds of all 276 MPs, which is 184 votes, and the notice must be signed by at least one-third, which is 92. The NPP holds fewer than 90 seats. The last censure vote, against Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta in December 2022, got 136 of the 183 votes it needed and failed.

As of 29 October, QMS News found no statement from the President or the Presidency on the resignation call.