Scores of Nigerian nationals have massed up to protest at the site where a building belonging to the Nigerian High Commission in Ghana was demolished last week.
The protests seemed to focus on the closure of Nigerian-owned shops engaging in the retail business.
Some of the protesters were chanting “we can’t breathe,” as they engaged the press.
“We are surviving by friends and sometimes we give them goods and they give us money,” one of them said to the press.
The shops where being closed in the enforcement of the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre Act (865).
But Nigerian traders had argued that that the ECOWAS protocol, which allows the free movement of people, goods and services in West African countries also allows them to trade in Ghana.
The Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA) and particularly Nigerian traders in the country have been at odds because of this issue.
The diplomatic controversy began when armed men reportedly invaded the residence of the High Commission and pulled down parts of a building under construction on the compound with a bulldozer.
The Foreign Affairs Ministry has begun investigations into the incident.
The Ministry further assured that the government will not relent on its efforts to “guarantee the safety of Members of the Diplomatic Corps in Ghana”
The Osu Stool also accused the Nigeria High Commission of trespassing on a parcel of land belonging to it.
