Day luck ran out of six ‘human traffickers’ in Katsina
Mr Nnadibe was the presumed leader of the team, while the rest stood as victims of human trafficking. They were paraded before newsmen by the NIS, Katsina State Command, two days after their arrest at Kwangwalam border in Mai’Adua Local Government Area of Katsina State, while attempting to cross to Niger Republic. For Uche, it […]
Mr Nnadibe was the presumed leader of the team, while the rest stood as victims of human trafficking. They were paraded before newsmen by the NIS, Katsina State Command, two days after their arrest at Kwangwalam border in Mai’Adua Local Government Area of Katsina State, while attempting to cross to Niger Republic.
For Uche, it was the first time he was caught trafficking humans, he told Sunday Trust. He said “this is my first time to facilitate other peoples’ trip to Niger Republic from Nigeria through illegal route, though I stayed in Libya for five years.”
Mr Nnadibe told our reporters that he was an employee of a private firm located in Libya and has been working with the company for five years.
He also denied being the leader of the team, saying “I am not the leader of the team. The rest of the apprehended persons are my co-travellers. They are on their own and I am on my own as well. I don’t know what will take them to Algeria. My only role in their trip is to guide them to cross the border to Niger Republic. Their relatives asked me to lead them get to Agades in Niger Republic and from there they will send money to them to proceed to Algeria through Libya. That’s all I knew about their trip to Niger Republic”
argued thus: “Their relatives asked me to facilitate their journey because they don’t know the route and they have never travelled to a far distant place like Niger from Lagos. I did not collect money from my co-travellers and or their relatives. The papers, I signed together with their relatives is that when we get to Agades we will depart and I will also be settled for the services I rendered from Nigeria to Niger Republic.”
But in what seems to be a counter to Nnadebi’s claim, Loveth Ebera, one of the victims, confirmed that Nnadebi was the leader of the group. She told Sunday Trust that he was the sole coordinator of their journey to Kano state from Oshodi in Lagos state and then to Kwangwalam border where they were arrested by security agents.
Ebera added that “I have never been to Niger Republic, not to talk of Libya or Algeria, our final destination. And if not because I was invited by my aunty, Linda Lucky, I will never attempt to go there through an illegal route. Having realised the dangers and the illegality of my action, I will never endanger myself again no matter who invites me to it.”
She also explained that her aunty, who was a hairdresser in Algeria for five years, contracted Nnadebi to take her to Niger Republic and then to Algeria where she will meet her aunty.
Asked whether she gave any money to Mr Uche for the trip, Ebera said “I have not paid a penny to him for the trip because he had already sealed his deal with Aunty Linda. And the arrangement was that after we get to Niger Republic, my Aunty will send money to me for my trip to Algeria. But for the expenses of my trip to Agades from Nigeria, I don’t know how much he was paid by my Aunty.”
With the exception of Miss Promise Jonathan, who obtained a genuine travelling passport, the rest of the suspects did not carry any travelling documents with them. The suspected leader of the team was found with an expired travelling passport, Sunday Trust learnt. The apprehended persons comprised two males and four females.
To the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), however, the recent arrest of Mr Nnadibe and his five co-travellers was a great achievement in the on-going crusade against trafficking of humans in Nigeria.
The suspects, according to comptroller, Nigeria Immigration Service, Katsina State command, Alhaji Umar Bulama violated the laws for attempting to travel outside the country through an illegal route and without travelling documents.
It was in view of that that the immigration personnel apprehended them and subsequently handed them over to the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking of Persons (NAPTIP) for prosecution, he added.
“The suspects were arrested while attempting to cross the Kwangwalam border on their way to Niger Republic enroute Libya to Algeria where they will meet their relatives,” said Bulama.
Our findings revealed that a number of people mostly women and children are being trafficked from rural communities of Oyo, Osun and Ogun States in the South-West; Akwa-Ibom, Cross River, Bayelsa States in the South-South; Ebonyi and Imo in the South East; Benue, Niger, and Kwara States in the Middle Belt) to cities such as Lagos, Abeokuta, Ibadan, Kano, Kaduna, Calabar and Port Harcourt.
Trafficking to these regions is predominantly for exploitative domestic work, farm labour and prostitution.