Onah is among Nigerians that returned from Libya on Friday.
He said: “When we got to Libya, the traffickers will hide
about 20 inside a pick up van and cover us with refuse. We would pay the pick us driver, who is a Libya between N150, 000
to N200, 000. The payment is made through our agents. Our agents would instruct
us to lie down inside the van. The driver would them cover us with tarpaulin,
before pouring refuse on us.
According to Onah, after covering them with refuse, the driver
would then bring out 50 liter of water and placed it on the victim’s back in
the van. The idea is to fool the security agencies into believing that the van
was truly carrying just refuse.
Onah recounted: “The first time I experienced it, six persons
among us died in the process. Their corpses were thrown into the desert. It was
from there I knew I was in problem. We were 15 that were trafficked. I embarked on the journey with the hope of crossing to Europe for
a better life. I wanted a better life for myself, parents and siblings. I
regret embarking on that journey. I spent three months in detention camp. We were
like fishes in the camp.”
Onah described the camp as a modern day slavery site, where
victims were sold. He disclosed that whenever it was nightfall, those of them
imprisoned get frightened and fidgeting.
He said: “When night comes, everyone get worried and scared.
Nobody knows who would be the next person to be sold. Everyone knows that
buyers usually come at night. In the camp, we ate a slice of bread. And it is
usually five persons to a plate of macaroni without water. There is no place
like home; many Nigerian girls were raped in our presence in the camp. We dared
not challenge the Libyan, unless such a person was ready to die. I thanked God
when my name was mention among those returning home.”
Another returnee, Isaac Omorodion, from Edo State said he
regretted going to Libya. He described it as dangerous and deadly, “going
through Libya to Europe.”
Omorodion said: “It’s better for me to manage whatever I have in my country and plan around
it. I spent a year and two months without achieving anything. It was almost
like I went there to suffer.”
Just like Onah, Omorodion said he and other others, held in the
Libya camp were fed a slice of bread. When it’s lunch time, they would beaten,
the ladies harassed, before the meal.
He said: “For about two weeks now, I have not had my bath. I
travelled to Libya in search of greener pasture. The plan was to cross to
Europe. I was a commercial driver in Benin before a friend advised me traveled
to Libya and cross over to Europe. I thank the federal government for
bringing us back home. We have suffered a lot in Libya. Many of us died over
there. Some usually go missing whenever mercenaries came to detention camp.”
Lucky Ozondu, from Agbor, Delta State said: “It was my younger
brother who had crossed to Europe through Libya that advised me to come to
Europe. He told me that the only way was for me to go through the route he
took. I left Nigeria on April 25, 2017. I had not spent a year in Libya, but I
saw death there. It was God that brought me back to Nigeria. I was
arrested two weeks after I arrived the country, on the street by some people
who were not police. They took me to the detention camp. It was inside the camp that the Libya men hit my head with iron. I
was unconscious for two days without medical care. It was God that revived me.
“I spent about
N850, 000 to get to Libya. We were like monkeys in the camp. When the Nigerian
Embassy officials, International organization for migrant and European Union
officials came to my camp to compile our lists, some girls who gave birth for Libyan
men, refused to return home. I decided to return home and start a new life.”
Another returnee, who didn’t want his name mentioned, explained
that it was due to inadequate feeding in the camp that some Nigerian nationals
and other Africans protested. They even attempted to pull down the gate of the
detention camp.
When guards at the camp noticed what was happening, they started
shooting sporadically. Many people sustained gunshot wounds. “Some of those
shot had not been seen since then,” he recollected.
He continued: “The guards told us that whoever that died,
would be taken out and dumped in the desert. Three of my friends, who were hit
by stray bullets were taken out and I have not seen them since then. People are
dying every day in the detention camp due to maltreatment.”
Emmanuel Kessh, from Delta State, who dropped out of
University to embark on the ill-fated journey, left Nigeria in August, 2017. He
expressed happiness on arrival to Nigeria.
His words: “I learnt that President Buhari has directed
evacuation of all Nigerians from Libya. I thank the President for this because Nigerians
in Libya are suffering and are being treated like animals. Nobody is talking
about human rights violations over there. This is a bitter experience, which I
will never pray for my worst enemy to go through.”
Mrs. Margret Ukegbu, Zonal Director of National African
Commission for Refugees and Migrants, speaking on behalf of the Commission
Chairman Alhaji Saidu Umar Farouk said: “The deportees were brought back by the
European Union and International organization for Migrants, but our own
role is to provide the returnees food, shelter and train those who want to
learn a trade in their shelter.
Those who which to stay in our shelters for 90 days will be taught
on different vocational skills like bead making, Cake baking, interior
decoration and a lots more, to start a new life, because of what they had gone
through in Libya. How traffickers hide us under refuse to escape arrest,
deportation- Libyan returnees
Mrs. Margret Ukegbu Zonal Director of National African
Commission for Refugees and Migrants spoke on behalf of the Commission Chairman
Alhaji Saidu Umar Farouk said, the deportees were brought back by the
European Union and International organization for Migrants, but their own
role was to provide the returnees food, shelter and trained those who want to
learn a trade in their shelter.
According to the National Emergency Management Agency,
another set of 164 Nigerian were brought back from Libya into the country by
the International Organisation for Migration (IOM). NEMA's Southwest Zonal Coordinator, Alhaji Suleiman Yakubu,
representing the Director General of the Agency, Engr. Mustapha Maihajja, who
received the returnees on behalf of the Federal Government, thanked the IOM and
the EU for their humanitarianism.
The Director General enjoined the returnees to learn from
the bitter lessons they learned in the course of their unpalatable sojourn and
make better use of opportunities which abound in Nigeria.
The returnees comprised of 155 male adults, three male
children, one infant male, five female adults, one female child and a female
infant. They all arrived via BURAQ airline 737 with registration number 5A-DMG
at Cargo Wing of Murtala Muhammad International Airport at around 2am at the weekend.
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