The Ethiopian prisoner transfer issue should not be viewed through the narrow lens of tribal sentiment. It should instead provoke serious questions about justice, due process, the treatment of Nigerians abroad, and the conditions at home that continue to drive our citizens to seek opportunities elsewhere.
By Fred Chukwuelobe
Nigeria recently entered into a prisoner transfer agreement with the Ethiopian government. The arrangement will facilitate the transfer of over 100 Nigerian inmates currently serving jail terms in Ethiopia, enabling them to complete their sentences in Nigeria.
To conclude the process, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Iyom Bianca Odumegwu Ojukwu, visited Ethiopia, met with the inmates, assured them of the government’s commitment to their transfer, and shared moments of encouragement, including a brief song-and-dance session with them.
Commendable as this humanitarian gesture is, the typical Nigerian reaction has once again exposed our deep-seated ethnic prejudices. Because an estimated 90 per cent of the prisoners are of Igbo extraction, some people have seized the opportunity to profile the entire Igbo ethnic group as criminals and drug traffickers. This does not surprise me. Such stereotyping has persisted for decades and has become deeply entrenched in the minds of tribal bigots.
My concern, however, is not with these tired and intellectually lazy stereotypes.
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What concerns me are the disturbing testimonies emerging from some of the inmates. Several claim they committed no crime but were detained without trial and had their money confiscated by Ethiopian authorities after leaving the airport during transit and entering the country.
Initially, I found these claims difficult to believe. When a friend first recounted similar stories to me, I dismissed them outright. My argument was simple: no transit passenger can lawfully leave an international airport and enter a country without the appropriate immigration clearance. Even in visa-free jurisdictions, a traveller must obtain official approval and be properly processed before entering the country.
I have personally experienced this. During a long layover in Doha, Qatar, I was granted permission to leave the airport, spend time in the city, and return for my onward journey without incident. Therefore, I found it difficult to accept that anyone could simply walk out of an airport, enter a country, and then be arrested merely for doing so.
However, after listening to more accounts from some of the inmates and former detainees, I am inclined to believe there may be more to this story than we presently know.
The reality is that the Nigerian passport is viewed with suspicion in many parts of the world. Unfortunately, Nigerians are frequently subjected to profiling because of the criminal activities of a minority of their compatriots abroad. In truth, Nigerian officials themselves are often guilty of profiling fellow Nigerians along ethnic and other discriminatory lines. The result is that many innocent citizens are treated as suspects before they have done anything wrong.
I have personally experienced such profiling on a number of occasions, and that experience makes me willing to keep an open mind regarding the claims emerging from Ethiopia.
At the same time, it must be acknowledged that many Nigerians have indeed been involved in criminal activities abroad. Their actions have damaged the country’s image and contributed to the suspicion with which all Nigerians are often viewed. Yet collective suspicion can never be a substitute for justice.
This is why I believe the Nigerian government must critically investigate the accounts being given by these prisoners. If there is evidence that some were detained without due process or denied their fair-trial rights, then the matter should be formally taken up with the Ethiopian government through diplomatic channels.
No Nigerian deserves to be deprived of liberty without due process. If a citizen commits a crime abroad, he should be arrested, charged, tried in accordance with the laws of the host country, and sentenced accordingly. Anything short of that amounts to injustice.
As for those mocking the Igbo people because many of the prisoners bear Igbo names, I have only one response: crime has no tribe and no ethnicity. Nigerians from every ethnic group have been arrested, prosecuted, and imprisoned in countries across the world. Criminality is an individual choice, not a tribal identity.
The larger issue should concern all Nigerians. Why do so many of our young people continue to leave the country in search of opportunities elsewhere? The answer lies in decades of poor governance, inadequate infrastructure, unemployment, economic hardship, and the failure of successive governments to create an environment in which enterprise can flourish.
If Nigeria were more livable and offered greater economic opportunities, many of these young people would not feel compelled to embark on uncertain journeys in search of greener pastures.
I often feel deeply insulted when black South Africans tell Nigerians to leave their country. Whether those targeted are predominantly Igbo, Yoruba, Hausa, or from any other ethnic group is irrelevant. What is being insulted is not a tribe but Nigeria itself. The humiliation is national, not ethnic.
That is why the Ethiopian prisoner transfer issue should not be viewed through the narrow lens of tribal sentiment. It should instead provoke serious questions about justice, due process, the treatment of Nigerians abroad, and the conditions at home that continue to drive our citizens to seek opportunities elsewhere.
Until we address these fundamental issues, we will continue to debate the symptoms while ignoring the disease.
These are the matters that truly arise from this controversy.
Fred Chukwuelobe, fnipr, a versatile journalist, wrote from Lagos
