A civil society group in Ghana has announced that it stopped about 20 young Ghanaians from joining the terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
The state owned newspaper Daily Graphic reported on Thursday that the Executive Director of the West Africa Centre for Counter-Extremism (WACCE), Mutaru Mumuni Muqthar revealed that a 21-year-old from northern Ghana was last year stopped from joining ISIS.
Mr Muqthar said he manged to stop the young man from joining ISIS with just hours to spare as part of his commitment to fight terrorism.
Daily Graphic quoted him a saying “Last year I saved a young man’s life. He had been radicalised online and was on his way to join the terrorist group ISIS after he spent time online looking for meaning in his life.”
“Just a day before leaving to join the group, he watched my TV outreach programme on counter-radicalisation, and that was what changed everything and he changed his mind,” he said.
Muqthar further said that “West Africa is one of the deadliest regions for terrorism. My plans are to expand my counter terrorism work to include the entire West Africa region, helping to dissuade vulnerable groups and individuals from engaging in violent extremism and falling into the void of terrorist recruitment.”
Source: Africafeeds.com
