The deportee of the United States (US) received by the government of Ghana, who made news headlines after she was captured being dragged on the floor by Ghanaian immigration officials, has spoken up for the first time about her ordeal.
The woman, who has been identified as 58-year-old Rabbiatu Kuyateh, is a Sierra Leonean nurse who had been living in Maryland, US, for about 30 years after she fled the war in her home country.
In an interview with media giant Reuters, Kuyateh said that she was arrested and detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in July 2025 because she had been living in the US without proper documentation.
She said that, despite a court ruling that she should not be deported to Sierra Leone because of fears that she might be tortured due to her father’s ties to the political opposition, the immigration authorities eventually deported her to Ghana in November 2025.
After staying at a hotel in Ghana for about six days, her worst fears came to pass when Ghanaian immigration officers told her they were sending her to her home country, which is what led to the scenes in the viral video.
“They (the Ghanaian immigration officers) asked if I was ready, and I said, ‘I’m ready for what?’ They said they were about to take me to the airport. I asked ‘what airport’, and they said they were about to take me to Freetown.
“That was when I responded to them and said, ‘Go to Freetown! Ghana is supposed to be my safe haven. I cannot go to Freetown because of political reasons,’” she narrated.
She went on to narrate how the Ghanaian officials began to forcibly remove her because of her resistance, disclosing that she was still suffering from injuries from the incident.
“So, they started dragging me downstairs. I had a wig on; they took the wig off. I still have a swollen leg. That was when I bumped my left ankle, so it is still swollen,” she said.
A video of the incident showed men in green and black uniforms dragging her across the hotel floor to a waiting van as she screamed, “I’m not going!”
Watch as immigration officers forcibly ‘drag’ US deportees from hotel
Kuyateh was eventually deported to Sierra Leone, but she managed to flee the country to another West African country.
Her lawyers have accused the government of Ghana of endangering her life and that of the other deportees it receives from the US as part of an MOU signed between the two countries.
Watch the interview below:
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