16 November 2019

...Emmanuel Essien was a fishing observer, one of Ghana’s frontline defenders against an overfishing crisis that is among the worst in west Africa. Illegal and destructive practices by foreign-owned trawlers are draining the Ghanaian economy of an estimated £50m a year...overfishing has driven small pelagic species known as “people’s fish”, the staple diet, to the verge of collapse. In 2015, as part of a $55m World Bank project, Ghana placed an observer on every industrial trawler, to collect data and report violations of fisheries law...

Essien’s diligence made him popular with the fisheries commission, according to his brother. His report on the penultimate vessel he worked on, dated 24 June, ended: “I humbly plead with the police to investigate further.” But his disappearance on 5 July from a trawler called Meng Xin 15, and the failure of the authorities to find out what happened, has devastated his family and shocked Ghana’s fishing community...Essien had been threatened, his family said, for reporting illegality on trawlers and was about to quit...In a hotel in Accra, several trawlermen...spoke on condition of anonymity...Two of them witnessed observers taking bribes...Some had been beaten by the Chinese crew – 90% of the vessels are estimated to be Chinese-owned...

The Meng Xin 15 belongs to a Chinese state-owned enterprise, Dalian Meng Xin Ocean Fisheries, according to an investigation by China Dialogue Ocean, which found the fleet has committed 16 fishing offences in Ghana since 2016. Its special status as an “offshore fishery enterprise of the ministry of agriculture” gives access to subsidies and tax exemption...