Ghanaians stranded at Turkish Airport

Some Ghanaians and other African nationals affected by the recent earthquake in Turkey are stranded at Gaziantep airport with no help in sight.

The stranded passengers are part of evacuees leaving Gaziantep to Ankara for shelter and safety.

Narrating his ordeal in a telephone conversation with BusinessWeekGhana, Abbey, a Ghanaian living in Turkey said, he and other affected victims were asked to go to the Gaziantep airport to be airlifted to Ankara. However, since Sunday morning (February 12,) when they got to the airport, they are yet to board any of the allocated flights to Ankara.

“We have been here since Sunday morning and up till now, we have not been airlifted even though we have tickets,” he lamented.
He recounted that they were refused from getting a ticket to Ankara due to the fact that they are foreigners and do not have the Turkish passport but they were later issued a 22:10  ticket to depart to Ankara after they started crying out for help, even though they got to the airport at 11:00am, and there was a flight of 17:45, but it wasn’t given to them, as stated by one of the personnel ” our priority is our citizens” when they reported this to the authority in charge their response was that the time of boarding doesn’t matters that they can get in the next flight of 17:45, but  they were later denied boarding because priority was given to children, the aged, the aggressive citizens and those that claims to be personnel, He (Abbey) stated that even though the flight was an evacuation flight as stated by the Turkish authority, approximately 60% of the flight space were being occupied by those claimed personnels and the AFET group, leaving little space for the others. They then decided to wait for the flight of 22:10 which was given to them officially, but same injustice was repeated, even though they were in the front row they couldn’t board the flight of 22:10, which came late and boarding ended as at 01:00am (Monday morning), “They rather boarded people who were not in the queue and left us stranded throughout the night,” he said.

This apparently infuriated the African nationals which nearly resulted in a commotion but they decided sleep over at the airport with the hope that they can board the flight of 9:50am (Monday morning).

On Monday morning when they availed themselves for boarding, they were told their tickets had expired.

“We joined the queue this morning for boarding only to be told that our tickets has expired, we even requested to buy the tickets but they won’t sell to us,”Abbey cried.

“We have been told to come back tomorrow (Tuesday) morning for our flight, but we are just afraid they might maltreat us again,” he feared.

According to Abbey, the Ghana embassy only advised them to find their own means to Ankara with an assurance that cost incurred will be refunded.
“After registering us, we were asked by the embassy to leave and when we get to Ankara, we would be refunded, but we can’t trust them,” he said.

“If the Turkish government is taking care of its own, why can’t our country also come to our aid?” he asked.

He pleaded with Ghanaian embassy in Turkey to come to their aid as a matter of urgency because they are in dire need.

A 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit southern Turkey early Monday and was felt across Syria, Jordan, and Israel, among other neighboring countries.
Preliminary information from the U.S. Geological Survey indicates the quake originated in Gaziantep, which is located in Turkey’s southeastern region and is a major provincial capital.

It was centered approximately 11 miles deep, according to USGS. A strong 6.7 temblor rumbled about 10 minutes later.
The extent of possible infrastructure damage, injuries, and possible deaths remains unclear at this time.

The earthquake has broken Turkey’s landscape and traumatised an already-troubled nation that had been preparing to celebrate its centenary this year.

Source: Businessweekghana.com