The Black Lives Matter movement has been going on all around the world in the wake of the death of George Floyd, an African American. The whole world is joining the protesters in American to demand justice for George Floyd as well as demand for a change in the American Justice system. The government of Ghana also held a memorial service in honor of George Floyd.
On the 6th of June, 2020 a group called Economic Fighters League organised a protest in Ghana dubbed, #AccraBlackOut. The group had a peaceful protest chanting “I can’t breathe, we are not safe”! The group Leader Ernesto Yeboah was arrested by the Ghana Police as the protest was on going. Before the Arrest of Ernesto Yeboah, he spoke to a JoyNews reporter.
“I feel very embarrassed as a Ghanaian to be met with such a situation where the state appears so inept; the state appears to have made a fool, a total fool of themselves to the rest of the world. I mean your station is here, there is international press here, and what message are you supposed to send to the world giving the fact, I mean, that we have a constitution that talks about notifying the police about gatherings like this in within five days. We did so as far back as six days ago. I mean, this is not the first time we’ve organised a program here. And every time we have organised a program here, we have gone through the same due process by notifying the police. sometimes they come around, sometimes they don’t come around. But never have we been prevented or inhibited in any way from holding such sessions. Only when it came to solidarising with black people all over the world, and especially black people in America. …” he said.
Ernesto Yeboah lamented that this is the first time they have been prevented by the police. He added that when a black person is maltreated either in America or any part of the world, it speaks to our reality. He also recounted some of the instances in this country that led to the death of Ghanaians and yet no justice has been served.
Ernesto concluded by saying “when we say Black Life Matters, we are simply talking about our reality having a correlation with the reality of all black people in the world“.