Ghana's Majority Chief Whip Dafeamekpor Condemns Xenophobic Violence in South Africa, Demands Continental Response
Ghana’s Majority Chief Whip and Member of Parliament for South Dayi, Rockson-Nelson Etse Kwami Dafeamekpor, has issued a forceful condemnation of the escalating xenophobic violence against African migrants in South Africa, calling the attacks a dangerous erosion of the continent’s founding principles and urging the African Union to establish a formal early warning system to detect and prevent such atrocities.
Speaking before the Pan African Parliament, Dafeamekpor described the wave of violence — which has intensified in recent weeks in Durban and KwaZulu-Natal — not as isolated incidents of community friction but as a systematic campaign of organised hostility against foreign nationals.
“What we are witnessing is not an isolated disturbance. It is not a misunderstanding between communities. It is not ordinary social frustration,” he told fellow parliamentarians. “What we are witnessing is the gradual normalisation of organised hostility against African migrants and foreign nationals under the dangerous disguise of ‘clean-up operations,’ ‘citizen enforcement,’ and ‘community protection.’”
A Crisis of Moral Authority
Central to Dafeamekpor’s address was a pointed critique of South Africa’s standing as a champion of human rights on the global stage. He argued that the country’s vocal advocacy for oppressed peoples abroad — including its prominent stance on Palestinian rights — rings hollow while African migrants face intimidation, forced displacement, and violence on South African soil.
“A nation cannot credibly condemn dehumanisation abroad while tolerating the dehumanisation of Africans at home,” he said. “The struggle for Palestinian dignity and the struggle for African dignity are not morally separate conversations.”
The MP warned that this contradiction threatens to erode the moral authority that South Africa has built over decades of anti-apartheid struggle, and that the selective application of human rights principles undermines the credibility of Africa’s collective voice on international justice matters.
“Human rights cannot be defended selectively. Justice loses credibility when compassion stops at the border,” Dafeamekpor said, adding that the phenomenon weakens the spirit of unity on which both the Pan African Parliament and the African Union were founded.
A Pattern of Intimidation
Dafeamekpor painted a vivid picture of the violence on the ground. Reports and viral footage have shown groups of individuals stopping migrants in public spaces, demanding identity documents, intimidating traders, and forcing foreign-owned businesses to close. In one documented incident, a Ghanaian resident in South Africa was confronted and told to “fix his own country” — conduct Dafeamekpor described as unlawful and inconsistent with African values.
“No private citizen has the legal authority to become an immigration officer. No mob has the constitutional right to decide who belongs in Africa,” he declared.
The condemnation carries particular weight given South Africa’s history. The country that once received solidarity from across the continent during its anti-apartheid struggle is now seen by many as betraying that legacy through its treatment of fellow Africans. For Ghana — a nation that played a foundational role in the pan-African movement under Kwame Nkrumah — the attacks strike at the heart of continental identity.
Calls for Institutional Action
Dafeamekpor outlined a series of concrete proposals for continental intervention. He called on the Pan African Parliament to pass a formal resolution condemning the attacks, and urged AU member states to ensure immediate investigations and prosecutions of perpetrators.
His most significant proposal was the establishment of an African Union early warning and response framework specifically designed to monitor and respond to xenophobic violence in real time. Such a mechanism, he argued, would allow the continent to intervene before tensions escalate into full-blown crises.
Beyond security measures, Dafeamekpor also pointed to the socio-economic roots of the violence. He called for enhanced economic cooperation across the continent and targeted youth employment initiatives to address the frustration that demagogues exploit to fuel anti-immigrant sentiment.
“The African continent cannot remain silent while anti-African violence evolves into organised intimidation,” he said. “Africa cannot preach unity in Addis Ababa while Africans bleed in African streets.”
The Broader Context
The MP’s intervention comes at a sensitive moment for the African Union, which has struggled to develop effective mechanisms for addressing internal conflicts among member states. South Africa’s economic dominance in the southern African region has long made it a magnet for migrants from neighbouring countries and beyond, but periodic outbreaks of xenophobic violence have repeatedly tested the continent’s commitment to free movement and solidarity.
For Ghanaian migrants in South Africa, the situation is both personal and urgent. Thousands of Ghanaians live and work in South Africa, many in the informal trading sector that has been particularly targeted by the recent violence. The Ghanaian government has so far expressed concern through diplomatic channels, but Dafeamekpor’s parliamentary intervention marks a more direct call for structural change.
His closing words to the Pan African Parliament captured the urgency: “Let our answer be courage over fear, unity over division, and justice over silence.”
The question now is whether the African Union and its member states will translate rhetoric into the kind of institutional response that Dafeamekpor and others are demanding — or whether the continent will continue to watch as its founding ideals are undermined from within.
Image Source: MYJOYONLINE
