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Participants at the African Diaspora Town Hall Meeting in Accra have called for streamlined policies to facilitate the integration of African Diasporans into the continent’s development.
The participants, comprising technocrats and civil rights activists, urged the African Union (AU) to address challenges relating to citizenship, visa acquisition, land ownership, investment and governance representation for Diasporans.
“We need to know that the Diasporans are people who have lost their roots as our fellow Africans, therefore, we should open our doors for them to come back in.
“And in so doing, we should not advance policies that will put impediments in their way,” Kwaku Darko Ankrah, Historian and Genealogist at the Institute of African Studies (IAS), University of Ghana, Legon, noted.
He questioned stringent naturalisation processes, including DNA testing and high fees, required for citizenship acquisition.
“How can we ask for these cumbersome processes from people whose linkage was violently broken?” he queried.
Mr Ankrah said the Transatlantic Slave Trade caused lasting damage to African societies.
“Over this period, an estimated 12 million Africans were forcibly taken from their homelands, packed onto ships, and sold into lifelong bondage,” he emphasised.
The meeting was organised by the Institute of African Studies of the University of Ghana, Decade of Our Repatriation (DOOR), a Pan-Africanist-based non-governmental organisation, The Black Agenda and the African American Association of Ghana.
It brought together stakeholders to deliberate on citizenship access, inclusion, representation and collective action, within the broader context of Pan-Africanism.
The discussions also took place against the backdrop of a recent United Nations resolution recognising the trafficking and enslavement of Africans as a crime against humanity, adopted on March 25 during the commemoration of the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
“The event is a call for representation, justice, and building a unified black agenda that reflects our shared destiny and development,” Obenfo Obadele Kambon, Associate Professor at IAS and founder of DOOR, said.
He said the AU recognised the Diaspora as a key partner in Africa’s development.
“Understanding the complexities of the Diasporans helps appreciate the diverse contributions of people of African descent globally and their ongoing influence in various spheres of life,” he said.
Prof Kambon urged African leaders to advance the ideals of Pan-Africanism through practical measures.
Nene Lomotey-Kuditchar, Vice President of the Association of African Political Scientists, said Ghana must address policy bottlenecks hindering Diasporan resettlement.
“I think that if Ghana really wants to continue to be the champion of what it started, the conversation now has to move around how to harmonise our citizenship acquisition, investment laws, and the resources needed to do these things.
“It is high time we moved from this symbol, this glory of Ghana living this Pan-African ideal, to really putting in place the right systems and structures,” he said.
More than 150 African Diasporans were granted Ghanaian citizenship in March 2026, while 524 were granted in November 2024, continuing the initiative that began with the “Year of Return” in 2019.
Earna Terefe-Kassa, a member of the African American Association of Ghana, said the Diasporan community possessed expertise critical to Africa’s development.
“Some of us that are over 70 and 80 years old, you know, especially in America, we have been through a lot.
“And to come here, and instead of feeling welcomed, you find out that it is going to cost us. It traumatises you. I do not think it is fair,” she lamented.
Source: GNA