The world has become too hostile to Nigerians. At home they are haunted by abject poverty, insurgency, armed robberies, banditry and kidnappings. The outside world is even more hostile. Everywhere in the world Nigerians are seen as defenceless and treated as such.
South Africa has proved to the world that one can kill or maim Nigerians without consequences. In the last three years South African police and a horde of lazy black xenophobes have brutally murdered 127 Nigerians and nothing has happened.
Two weeks ago, Malaysian immigration officials leveraging on the impunity of South African police and black xenophobes, brutally murdered Thomas Orhionsefe Ewansiha, a 34-year-old Nigerian PhD student of Limkokwing University of Creative Technology in Malaysia.
Ewansiha was waiting for his meal in a restaurant when Malaysian immigration officials in plain cloths stormed the scene in search for illegal immigrants. Everyone scampered for safety.
Ewansiha made a quick dash for his car but the predators pounced on him, handcuffed and herded him and other victims into Bukit Jalil immigration detention facility.
Even after showing them his valid student visa, the Malaysian tormentors refused to free him.
The claim now is that they needed time to verify the authenticity of Ewansiha’s visa. It took them more than five days to verify it in a country where immigration services is heavily computerised.
The man died in detention from what is generally believed to be the result of extensive torture.
After his death, the Malaysian Immigration Service arranged a make-shift autopsy without the knowledge his family members or even the Nigerian High Commission in Kuala Lumpur.
The High Commission in its characteristic docility is now begging for the report of investigation into the murder.
Sometime in June, 2019, Mrs. Elizabeth Uju Ndubuisi-Chukwu, the deputy director-general of Chartered Insurance Institute of Nigeria (CIIN), travelled to South Africa for a conference arranged by African Insurance Organisation (AIO). On the night of June13, she was strangled to death in her room in the Emperor Palace Hotel in Johannesburg. At first the five star hotel, reportedly refused to furnish South African police with the CCTV footage of what happened in late Mrs. Ndubuisi-Chukwu’s room. When the CCTV footage was eventually retrieved, it reportedly showed that no one entered Mrs. Ndubuisi-Chukwu’s room. Ironically, the report of the autopsy released on June 20, concluded that she was strangled to death.
The whole world is hostile to Nigerians because everyone knows that Nigerians could be killed or maimed without any consequence. Developed countries protect their citizens at home and abroad.
On October 19, 2012, the Nigerian Navy impounded a Russian vessel decked out with illegal arms and arrested its crew.
They were eventually charged to court for illegal possession of arms. The Russian Embassy was adequately represented in court throughout the trial. Sometimes the ambassador appeared in court to observe the trial. He personally took the suspects on bail.
When the trial appeared to be dragging too long, the foreign ministry in Moscow demanded a speedy trial of the Russian criminals from the Nigerian foreign ministry.
The Russian government ensured that the criminals got a fair and speedy trial.
Law-abiding Nigerians in the Diaspora do not enjoy from their government what criminals from developed countries enjoy. Nigerian missions abroad are very hostile to Nigerians. They see any Nigerian seeking their assistance as an intruder. Malaysian immigration officials brutalised and murdered Ewansiha because they knew that no one would go beyond the ritualistic request for skewed investigation into the murder.
In the last 30 years successive Nigerian governments have convinced the world that Nigerians are dispensable.
The federal government can reverse that misconception. The murders of Mrs. Ndubuisi-Chukwu and Ewansiha could be used to set matters right. South Africa has taken Nigeria for a ride for too long.
It has cunningly supported lazy, black xenophobes in their murderous plans against Nigerians.
No Nigerian in South Africa has committed a crime as grievous as what South African companies perpetrate in Nigeria. For several months, MTN defiantly opened 1.5 million unregistered phone lines for use in committing crimes against Nigerians. As Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) imposed the stipulated penalty on MTN, the president of South Africa rushed down and negotiated a mitigated penalty for the corporate criminal. The federal government cowered and settled for less than half of the penalty for the crime. The case was different when Nigeria was at the receiving end.
Western powers blocked Nigeria from purchasing arms in the open market to fight the insurgents in the North-east, thus compelling the federal government shop for arms with cash in South Africa. On September 5, 2014, South Africa confiscated the sum of $9.5 million from agents of Nigerian security services who were in the country to purchase arms. It took almost one year of grilling for Nigeria to secure the release of the cash.
The government of South Africa and its black xenophobes are Nigeria’s arch enemies. Malaysia is equally hostile to Nigerians but they have killed fewer Nigerians than South Africa because there are more Nigerians in South Africa than in Malaysia.
The government of South Africa must be compelled to account for the death of Mrs. Ndubuisi-Chukwu.
As for the primitive immigration officials in Malaysia who murdered Ewansiha, their government must be compelled to punish them. Malaysia must also pay adequate compensation for the life lost.
That is the only way to convince the world that no one kills or maims a Nigerian without consequences.
