Yoruba nation activist, Chief Sunday Adeyemo, popularly known as Sunday Igboho, on Monday, raised the alarm over alleged killing and torture of some Nigerians in Egyptian prisons for various immigration offences.
He also urged President Bola Tinubu to quickly intervene in their plights in order to save them from avoidable death and other dehumanising treatment they are being subjected to before it is too late.
In a personally signed press statement forwarded to journalists, Adeyemo, said that credible information at his disposal indicated that few of the Nigerian nationals arrested by the Egyptian government authorities have reportedly lost their lives as a result of long torture and brutal treatment from prison officials in the North Africa country.
The statement reads: “I have been receiving calls in the last two weeks from some of these detained Nigerians and their relatives over the degrading and inhuman treatment they are facing without any intervention from the Nigerian Embassy in Cairo.
“I’m pleading with President Bola Tinubu, who is compassionate and has a listening ear to come to the rescue of these helpless Nigerians. While I don’t condone any form of illegality, I feel pained and worried over their pathetic situation. But the timely intervention of our president at this crucial time can still save the detainees from further suffering and imminent deaths.
“Unfavourable economic conditions in Nigeria, which became aggravated during the eight-year ænure of former President Muhammadu Buhari further forced many Nigerians who cannot afford to relocate to Europe and the United States of America due to excruciating hardship to travel by roads to Egypt, Libya, Morocco and other African countries in search of greener pastures.
“If successive governments at the federal level before the advent of Tinubu’s presidency had created an enabling socioeconomic atmosphere for individuals to explore their potentials and provided good governance, Nigerians in their thousands will not be leaving the country for ancertainty in foreign countries.
“In the same vein, contending issues of nepotism, inequalities among ethnic groups, political domination by a section of Nigeria, absence of true federalism and corruption which somehow fuelled agitation for self-determination by some groups will not have come up if our leaders had implemented policies to address these national challenges.
“While some of these citizens gained entry into these African countries through legitimate means, others adopted illegal methods out of their desperation to exit Nigeria due to stifling economic conditions amidst frustration and debilitating poverty. But I am begging President Bola Tinubu to deploy diplomatic measures to secure the freedom of these Nigerians.
“The critical involvement of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM) headed by Honourable Abike Dabiri-Arewa in the pitiable condition of these categories of Nigerians is key to ensuring that the needful is done to address this problem. NIDCOM has been involved in protecting the fundamental human rights of Nigerians in the diaspora with accolades Testimonies abound on the effectiveness of NIDCOM in assisting Nigerian citizens m distress. They should please swing into action to salvage our people trapped in prisons not only Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Africa, but other countries,” the statement concluded.
