TWO HUNDRED and fourteen Ghanaians are allegedly living in undesirable conditions in Libya, the North African oil-rich country, according to information available to DAILY GUIDE.
The stranded Ghanaians, who are currently living at Tripoli, the capital of Libya, according to sources, have no access to food, water, light and other basic necessities.
One of the stranded Ghanaians, Morgan Donkor, told Radio Mercury, a Kumasi-based radio station, in a telephone interview from their base on the desert on Tuesday afternoon that they had been trapped in that area for several weeks.
He said they were contracted by a foreign building and construction company, which was under the auspices of the Libyan government, as constructional workers who worked in various fields of the company.
Morgan, who claimed to be a resident of Techiman in the Brong Ahafo region, said they had been trapped on the desert because the company had refused to pay them for the services they rendered to the company.
According to him, the company owed the 214 people a total amount of 440 thousand dollars for the various services they rendered to the company in the area of carpentry, masonry, mechanical service among others.
Disclosing that the company used them to construct over 6,000 housing units as part of its agreement with the Libyan government, Morgan noted that depending on the kind of job one was assigned to, they were required to receive between 4,000 dollars to 2,000 dollars.
He indicated that every effort to get the company to pay them their money did not yield any result, pointing out that the intervention by the Ghanaian ambassador to Libya to save the situation had also proved futile.
Morgan stated that their attempt to voice out their irritation to President Mills when he visited the country recently fell on the rocks as the Libyan authorities made everything possible to stop them. He added that five of them were arrested and thrown into jail.
He said in as much as they wanted the company to pay them their money, they also wanted the Mills government to come to their aid and possibly airlift them back to the country so that they could regain their freedom.
Source: GhanaWeb
