The House of Representatives yesterday, expressed angst as Chairman, Committee on Diaspora, Abike Dabiri- Erewa, read names of Nigerian students killed under mysterious circumstances in Ghana, Russia, South Africa. Malaysia and UAE and vowed to probe the killings.
Consequently, the House in plenary, mandated the Committees on Diaspora, Justice and Foreign Affairs to conduct a public hearing on the issue and submit their reports within two weeks.
Dabiri-Erewa in a motion under matters of national importance, entitled, ‘Killings of Nigerians abroad,’ had enumerated and explained how Nigerian students were killed overseas.
The motion was seconded by Stella Dorgu, PDP, Bayelsa State, and immediately the Speaker, Aminu Tambuwal, gave his nod, Dabiri-Erewa painted a bad picture of how Nigerian students were being murdered in cold blood and sent to their early graves abroad.
She said: “The alarming increase in the number of Nigerian students murdered abroad in search of education has made them an endangered species.
In Ghana four Nigerian students have been killed in mysterious circumstances in the last few months.”
The APC legislator said that in October 2013, an SS 3 student of Ideal College, Ghana, 15-year-old Master Austine Ogukwe, died mysteriously.“
”In November, barely 26 days after Ogukwe’s death, two Nigerian students, Eddy and Charles of KNUS Federal University Accra, lost their lives, during an excursion with their school, they claimed they got drowned.
”Only two weeks ago, Mr. Godwin Ayogu, a 300 level Social Science student of University of Cape Coast Central Region was brutally killed on February 20 and his lifeless body was found on campus,” Dabiri-Erewa said.
Explaining further, she said Malaysia police killed one Tunde Adelabu from Ekiti State, a student of Lagenda University, Nilai, Malaysia, adding that more than 80 Nigerian students were currently in danger in Malaysia, according to reports, with no intervention whatsoever from the nation’s embassy in Malaysia.
She said: “Also, a group of unknown Russians last two weeks stabbed a female Nigerian, Forester Samson, to death in Russia.
“In Dubai, Toba Falode, 19-year-old son of a popular sports caster, Aisha Falode, a student of SAE Institute, Dubai, died in mysterious circumstances.
”In South Africa, the humiliating video of a Nigerian man stripped and beaten publicly by South African police has made news all over the world.“
After listening to the gory tales of how Nigerian students died abroad, the Speaker asked members to debate the issue. Dabiri-Erewa in her concluding submission, said the plethora of deaths engulfing Nigerian students was fast becoming something else.
”Two weeks ago, our students were brutally murdered in Yobe and then globally, they kill our students almost every other week, this must stop,” she said.
Other speakers in favour of the motion included Toby Okechukwu, Sani Mohammed, Asita Honourable Asita, Kamil Akinlade, Uzoma Nkem-Abonta.
Abonta in his contribution, said there was need for Nigerians to be cautioned, noting tht 90 per cent of Nigerians were good at breaking laws.
