The Vice President of the National Union of Ghanaian Students (NUGS) in Ukraine, Samuel Selorm Dzemakey, has said that government cannot claim all the glory for their safe return into the country.
He revealed that other actors played key roles to ensure their exit from the crisis-ridden region of Ukraine.
“Government can’t take all the commendation that they did everything. First of all NUGS helped in bringing everyone together to cross the border and Pentecost played a role…”
According to him, prior to government buying them return tickets into Ghana, Ghanaian students in Ukraine struggled to cross the Ukrainian border into other safe regions.
He revealed that through the effort of his father, Mr. Bismark Dzemakey and his uncle, Peter Kofi Dzemakey, who is an apostle in the Church of Pentecost, they were rescued.
“My father who is a Pentecostal Pastor called the Romanian National Head of the Church of Pentecost to assist his children to get across the border. He sent people to meet us since he was far away. It was lovely and I didn’t expect that. They gave us plenty food to eat and one kept me in his car since I was freezing.”
Narrating his exodus from Ukraine, he disclosed that there was heavy traffic on the outskirts of Chernivtsi [the city he resided in] towards the Ukraine border into Romania.
Speaking in Twi, he said “we had to disembark from the bus since cars were not moving due to heavy vehicular traffic. I walked for about one hour and 30 minutes before reaching the border.”
He said that though the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration wrote a letter to aid them cross the border, it proved futile since they had no ambassador to speak on their behalf.
He noted that the soldiers asked the ‘blacks’ to go back and allow the Ukrainian women and children to pass.
The NUGS vice president however, was grateful that the Deputy Ambassador to Czech Republic came to their rescue in Romania.
“The ambassador booked a hotel for us stay and gave us money for food. He later took our passports and paid for our tickets which was paid for by government”, he declared.
Selorm was worried about Ghanaians in the city of Sumi [bordering Russia] who are stuck indoors with no food and water and can’t come out because Russia has besieged the city.
