48, not 500 Nigerians deported from UK – Immigration

The United Kingdom Government on Wednesday deported 48 Nigerians over immigration related offences.

The deportees came aboard a chartered plane that touched down at the Hajj and Cargo Terminal of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos at about 8am, our correspondent gathered.

Lagos airport

The Spokesperson of the Nigerian Immigration Service, Mr. Ekpedeme King, who confirmed the development, said the Nigerians were deported for immigration-related offences.

“Some of them have overstayed their visa,” King said.

According to King, it is part of the duty of the NIS officials at the airport to receive Nigeria deportees from foreign countries.

Top immigration officials at MMIA, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the 48 deportees had nothing to do with the 29,000 Nigerians that the UK was planning to deport back into the country.

The British Broadcasting Corporation had reported in the morning that a plane carrying about 500 Nigerians deportees from the UK had landed at the MMIA. The reported quoted some of the deportees as saying that they were not happy to come back.

However, the NIS officials said only 48 Nigerians deportees arrived from the UK.

Nigeria had recently expressed concern over the UK’s plan to deport 29,000 Nigerians, and has insisted that due process be followed before Nigerians are removed from the UK.

The Federal Government had said the UK must ensure that those been deported are really Nigerians, medically fit to travel and have a role to play in the country – meaning they should be able to fit into Nigerian society.

48, not 500 Nigerians deported from UK – Immigration

Nigerian woman gives birth at sea minutes after rescue

She was rescued from a sinking dinghy in the Mediterranean. And minutes later she gave birth to a baby.

The new born baby

Had she not been saved by the Italian coast guard, she would have sunk with the baby.

The woman, believed to be a Nigerian, had been attempting to cross the sea on a rickety dinghy with around 100 other migrants and refugees when it began to deflate.

After being rescued by the Italian coast guard, the woman went into labour as the boat was on its way to the island of Lampedusa.

After giving birth, the woman was helped off the boat. A coast guard carried her baby in a blue blanket.

Both mother and baby were in hospital doing well The Mirror reported last night.

The woman is one of 300,000 refugees and migrants who have crossed the Mediterranean  into Europe this year, up from 219,000 in the whole of 2014.

2,760 people have died this year in their attempt to make it across the sea from the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

The United Nations (UN) yesterday urged Europe to guarantee relocation for Syrian refugees, as record numbers flee to Macedonia and Greece.

A record 7,000 Syrian refugees arrived in the former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia on Monday, while some 30,000 are on Greek islands, including 20,000 on Lesbos, the UN said.

Nigerian woman gives birth at sea minutes after rescue

Naija Politics: Jonathan gives Immigration Recruitment victims’ families money, jobs after one year

A year after pledging jobs to families who lost loved ones during a deadly recruitment by the Nigeria Immigration, President Goodluck Jonathan on Friday, finally, handed out money and appointment letters to the beneficiaries.

Deceased

Mr. Jonathan gave N75 million (N5million to each family) as well as employment letters to families of those who died in the botched exercise.

Fifteen applicants lost their lives in multiple stampedes across job recruitment venues across the country, as hundreds of thousands thronged the stadia used as examination venues, to vie for the jobs.

Despite the scandal that followed, as it became clear the Minister of Interior, Patrick Abba Moro, was behind the sloppy handling of the exercise, Mr. Jonathan has refused the fire the minister, a close ally of the Senate President, David Mark.

A Senate investigation into the matter confirmed that Mr. Moro singlehandedly selected a company to conduct the recruitment, violating government rules.

Worse, the firm, Drexel Limited, charged each of the more than 500,000 candidates, N1000, for the examinations they eventually did not write.

Mr. Jonathan retained the minister and also refused to order that the money be refunded.

The president merely cancelled the exercise and promised jobs to families of the victims.

Even that pledge has taken a year and public outcry to be fulfilled.

On Friday, each of the families of the deceased was handed a cheque of N5million naira each, while three family members were given employment letters.

Speaking shortly after, Mr. Jonathan said the incident will never repeat itself.

“I promise this country that such will not happen again. This will be the last of such things,” he said.

Mr. Jonathan said the money given to the families of the deceased should not be seen as compensation because it cannot replace the lives lost.

The Comptroller General of the Immigration Service, David Paradang, told journalists that out of the 45 candidates due employment beneficiaries, 10 had to be replaced because they did not meet the criteria of the service.

He explained that some of them were shorter than required, overweight or over-aged adding that the families of the 10 were asked to bring replacement for their slots.

He noted that some of those who are graduates were employed as Assistant Superintendent, those with National Certificate of Education, were employed as Assistant Inspectors, while those with the West African School Certificate, were employed as Immigration Officers 3.

The Minister of Interior, Abba Moro, said the government accepts the incident as an act that was not planned for.

He said those wounded in the exercise will not be forgotten adding that they will be included in the second phase recruitment which is ongoing till May.

Naija Politics: Jonathan gives Immigration Recruitment victims’ families money, jobs after one year

NIS recruitment: Only N45m out of N710m released for deadly Immigration screening

“For all my years in the service, no one had ever taken away from us the right to recruit the Cadre B officials. And that was why I protested very vehemently,” Mr. Parradang said.

Despite raising at least N710 million from poor applicants, recruitment consultant, Drexel Limited, and interior ministry authorities released only N45 million for the conduct of the screening into the Nigeria Immigration Service, which ended in fatalities, a member of the supervisory board told senators Thursday.

Deceased

At least 16 job seekers died in stampedes across Nigeria on March 15, sparking widespread outrage and calls for the removal of the Minister of Interior, Patrick Abba Moro, and Comptroller General of Immigration, David Parradang.

The Secretary of the Civil Defence, Fire, Immigration and Prisons Services board, S. D. Tapgun, told the senate committee on interior investigating the exercise that 710,000 people registered for the test, according to figures provided by the consultant, Drexel Limited. The board had no independent means of knowing the exact figure, he said.

Lawmakers heard how despite raising the huge amount, the board and the ministry still had no funds to conduct the exercise.

The secretary of the board, Mr. Tapgun, said funding was a serious challenge, and gave the impression it was the main reason the minister, Mr. Moro, refused suggestions that the exercise be staggered and conducted separately based on cadres.

Mr. Tapgun said the board estimated the exercise to cost N201 million, but after collecting N710 million, the consultant, Drexel, only released N45 million for the exercise to be conducted.

In a letter read at the hearing, the consultant had made it clear that by the terms of their agreement, it was the responsibility of the board or the ministry to fund the recruitment, as it was only contracted to provide online registration services.

The N45 million released by the firm, was regarded merely as a discretionary contribution, a disclosure lawmakers said was one of the clearest signs the government board had lost control over a firm it claimed to have hired.

Abba Moro, Minister of Interior

Testimonies given yet at the hearing Thursday point to an exercise hijacked by the minister, Mr. Moro, who is yet to respond at the hearing. Save the secretary, other speakers said they were not duly informed of plans for the recruitment that turned deadly in the end.

The Comptroller-General, Mr. Parradang, denied knowledge of the planning for the exercise and said his suggestions were brushed aside. Another member of the board made similar claim.

In his first official comment since the disaster, Mr. Parradang said his first information about recruitment into an organization he heads, came from a newspaper advert.

Speaking Thursday before the Senate committee, the immigration boss said he raised the letter after telephone conversations with all key members of the board, during which those contacted denied knowledge of the advert calling for applications.

One member of the board, Mustapha Karim, who also testified at the hearing, also said he was not aware of the plans, neither was the recruitment ever discussed at any of the board’s meetings as should have been the case.

The board member said he and other members of the board only knew of the plans after being shown a copy of the agreement for the recruitment between the interior ministry and Drexel Limited.

Mr. Karim said the agreement was signed by the minister, Mr. Moro, without the knowledge of the board. The second signature, purportedly by the former secretary of the board, Mr. Attahiru, may have been forged, he said. Mr. Karim told lawmakers Mr. Attahiru had personally confirmed to him that he never signed the document.

The Immigration boss, Mr. Parradang, said one of the most outstanding breaches of the exercise was the decision by the planners to take over the recruitment of both the senior and junior cadre, unlike past practices whereby the supervising board takes charge of the senior cadre, while Immigration Service recruits the junior cadre. The minister, Mr. Moro, is the chairman of the board.

“For all my years in the service, no one had ever taken away from us the right to recruit the Cadre B officials. And that was why I protested very vehemently,” Mr. Parradang said.

On why he did not complain about the anomalies, or initiate a process to abort the planned recruitment when it was clear the exercise did not follow the expected practice, Mr. Parradang said “It is very clear from my presentation that why we could not stop this process was because we were not the drivers of the process.” (0)

NIS recruitment: Only N45m out of N710m released for deadly Immigration screening