ASKY Airline flies home surviving Nigerians stowaway from Liberia
ASKY Airline has flown back to Lagos 11 surviving Nigerians stowaway that landed in Liberia in their quest to seek greener pastures abroad. They were 13 in number but two of them were not so lucky as they were discovered by the crew who tortured them till they gave up the ghost. A 9-man team of the Liberian Immigration officers that escorted the survivors to Nigeria was led by Capt.Mark Weaye. The returnees are Seyi Popoola, Precious Uwalogho, Ayetimiyi Kelvin, Stephen Junior, Emmanuel Benjamin, Balogun Gbenga, Temiotan Adewale, Igiebor Stephen, Hamza John, Alfred Ese and Ogechi Chika and one Cameroonian Sources revealed that , the stowaways all sneaked into the basement of Ophelia Panama, a cargo ship at Tin Can Island, Apapa, Lagos at about 12 midnight on Wednesday, 7th September 2022 after transporting themselves on a smaller boat to the ship. It was also gathered that they entered with their personal belongings and some food items, with the hope of somehow making it any country in Europe. “The ship set out for Europe in the morning, without the slightest knowledge of the crew of Ophelia Panama .” On the fifth day of their trip, after the exhaustion of all the food items in their possession and they were close to starvation, they all decided to come out of their hiding. They presented themselves to the ship’s crew in hope of some sympathy and food for survival. However, upon their appearance before the crew members of the ship, they were all subjected to severe physical and mental torture. Thereafter, they were dumped into the waters in their threes by the crew members. Two Nigerians of them, namely Frank and Osas, died in the process, the Cameroonian was nowhere to be found while the remaining eleven sustained a lot of injuries. While struggling for their survival in the waters, they were rescued by Liberian fishermen who tended to their injuries and alerted the Liberian Immigration Service. He said, “We met each other on the ship, we are 14 with one Cameroonian. We moved from Nigerdock entering the vessel through the rudder side. When the ship was moving after four days our food finished and so we wanted help from the crew. Unfortunately, the crew started spraying us chemicals which were burning our skins while demanding us to jump into the high seas. Comptroller of Immigration Service,Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Command, CIS Adeola Adesokan who received the stowaways handed them over for documentation and profiling and made provisions for their feeding and allowed them to share their horrifying experiences for the world to hear. ” We discovered they are bonafide Nigerians making efforts to run away from the shores of the country. Their story is very harrowing, very pitiable, there was hot water flushing , thrown into the high sea and left to destiny. On behalf of the Controller General Isah Jere Idris we want to thank the Commander General for immigration for Liberia for their kind gesture.” |
