After a two week wait, a South African who was stranded in Ghana was finally able to touch down in Mzansi.

“It is good to be back on South African soil,” Calvin Jacobs said.

Jacobs, from Morningside, Durban, is a project manager on a gas pipeline in Takoradi, 200km east of Accra. He had been stranded in Ghana as the country closed its airports 12 hours before he was meant to fly back home.

On Monday, he arrived in Johannesburg with about 60 other South Africans who work in Ghana following a repatriation process facilitated by the department of international relations and co-operation (Dirco).

After landing and undergoing a sanitising process at the airport, the group was taken to a Johannesburg hotel for a mandatory 14-day quarantine.

“We waited two weeks to be repatriated back home. A total of 60 South Africans in different parts of Ghana came home. We were in contact with the SA high commissioner. They were professional and caring,” Jacobs said.

Upon arrival, he said officials from the department of health did screenings on the plane before the passengers disembarked.

“Members of the SA Police Service escorted us to our hotels for quarantine. The facilities are good and the normal protocol is in place.”

Despite still not being with his family, Jacobs said he was happy to be back in SA and could not wait to travel home to Durban.

“My family is happy I am in South Africa. I did miss my daughter's birthday but as soon as I go to Durban I will buy a big birthday cake for her and make sure there is mutton curry.”

Jacobs is part of about 800 South Africans who have been repatriated from various countries in the past two weeks by government. The most recent group landed from Lagos, Nigeria, on Monday.

Spokesperson for Dirco, Lunga Ngqengelele, said  government is assisting people who were stuck in various countries due to the coronavirus lockdown put in place last month.