NPP UK and Ireland is welcomes the news of our 55 brothers and sisters who have been evacuated from strife torn Libya but is deeply worried and concerned by the apparent lack of clarity and coherence on the part of the Mills-Mahama NDC administration’s plan to evacuate the over 4000 brothers and sisters still trapped in the carnage of Libya. We are picking up on daily basis news and eye witnesses reports of fierce clashes in the Libyan capital between Muammar Gaddafi's security forces and anti-regime protesters while state television aired images of the embattled but defiant strongman urging supporters to defend the nation. There are reports of mass killings, arbitrary arrests, detention and torture of protesters.

This carnage has been described as a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions and caught in the midst of this carnage are unsuspecting Ghanaians among the thousands who are being killed or injured and yet the government of Ghana has not come with any concrete plans to evacuate our embattled nationals. More violence is unfolding daily as the many countries have drawn out clear plans aimed at desperately evacuating its citizens from Libya. There are both land, sea and air evacuation plans being unfolded by many nations whose nationals are caught in this, except Ghana. According to credible information, the Ghanaian government is covertly supporting Gaddafi and hoping that Gaddafi’s army will be able to quell the uprising. The Ghanaian Embassy in Tripoli is therefore being accused of not being responsive to the plight of our brothers and sisters.

The only message from the government is a sublimed propaganda that the government will meet with security agencies on Friday, February 25 to decide the best evacuation strategy to bring home Ghanaians in Libya. Well the Friday dead line has passed and nothing has happened. In the same report the government is now collating data on the number of Ghanaians in Libya-how incredible. What has the Ghanaian embassy in Libya been doing all these years if it has no idea of how many Ghanaians are in Libya, at least officially. Our investigations and enquiries with the Libyan Information Centre in Tripoli and corroborated by Mr Barima Appiah, a Ghanaian Resident in Tripoli say there are over 4,000 Ghanaians in Libya currently stranded and their appeals to the Ghanaian Embassy have fallen on deaf ears

We are not particularly surprised by this apathetic attitude of the Mills-Mahama administration towards Ghanaians in Libya. After all the PNDC had strong links with Col. Gaddafi’s Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya (Libya). Therefore the current NDC administration is a direct product of the brutal regime of Libyan terror. We have credible information reaching our news desk in London that Ghanaians have been recruited to fight alongside the Revolution Guard of Col Muammar al-Gaddafi as mercenaries and these were recruited through the Ghana Embassy in Tripoli.

While governments throughout the world are condemning the carnage in Tripoli, Benghazi and other cities it Libya our government has kept silent and are tacitly supporting Col. Gaddafi to kill his own people and collaterally our people as well. While it did not take much to switch the national security alert to red, we poignantly note that for a situation of an imminent and a potential human catastrophe there is not disaster relief plan to get our national out as the foreign policy is switched to “dzi wo fie asem” alert.

The revolutions sweeping the Arab world started just after Christmas with the voice of the people sweeping the deserts of Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Bahrain, Yemen and lately Libya. All these countries have Ghanaian nationals trapped in there and yet we have not seen any evacuation plans by the Ghana government.

Our people are being burnt, raped and murdered and while we have a window of opportunity to evacuate them, we are busily collating figures, according to Okudzeto Ablakwah. NATO and UN, including EEC are seriously considering sanctions and very soon there is going to be sea and air blockade which will make any evacuation difficult if not impossible.

We are calling on the government of Ghana as a matter of urgency to put into place air and sea evacuation, as well as, disaster relief plans to bring our brothers and sisters home. Every Ghanaian matters and no one must be left behind. Everybody goes home should be the target for our government. We wish to state that every lost time is a life lost from the moment the anti-government demonstrations started.

We also call on the government of Ghana to openly join the international world in their condemnation of the killing of innocent civilians and children by the government of Muammar Gadhafi. We have got to be guided by the voice of the people, the voice of reason and support them in their quest for freedom. Furthermore, we are calling for the Mills-Mahama administration to apologise to Ghanaians for the government's slow and inept handling of the evacuation of Ghanaian nationals from Libya and learn the lessons of seizing opportunities and moments in order to ensure that no Ghanaian life is lost due to procrastination and lack of proper planning as being currently exhibited by the NDC government. Finally, we are calling on the President to take a decisive step and evacuate Ghanaians caught up in the Libyan crises now as we will hold the government responsible for any loss of Ghanaian life.

Hayford Atta-Krufi Chairman, NPP UK & Ireland

Nana Yaw Sarpong, Communications Officer, NPP UK and Ireland

27 February 2011