Gradually but steadily, Nigerians living in South Africa have become objects of attack and, in some cases, extra-judicial killing. And because not much is known to be done by the authorities in both countries over the barbaric trend, the perpetrators have always gone scot-free.
Regrettably, some of the heinous incidences were carried out by South African law enforcement agents that, ordinarily, should offer protection to both the foreigners and citizens.
The confirmation by the Nigerian Union in South Africa of the killing of its member, Kingsley Ikeri, at Vryheid Town in Kwazulu Natal Province on August 30 adds to the xenophobic tendencies of the country’s security agents against other nationals.
Ikeri, 27, was a businessman from Mbaitolu in Imo State was reportedly tortured to death by the police.
According to reports attributed to Bartholomew Eziagulu, Chairman of the Union in the province, Ikeri was arrested by the police alongside a friend, on suspicion of carrying hard drugs. But during interrogation, he had his face covered with plastic in a bid to extort information from him.
“In the process, they suffocated the deceased. When the police took him to the hospital, he was confirmed dead,” Eziagulu said.
This is not the first time a Nigerian would be killed in such gruesome manner in South Africa. Metropolitan Police in Cape Town had, in December 2016, murdered another Nigerian, Victor Nnadi, also from Imo, in similar circumstance.
Statistics indicate that 116 Nigerians have been killed in South Africa through extra-judicial means in the last two years. Curiously, seven in 10 of the killings were carried out by the police.
This is cruelty taken too far. Of course, some of the offences alleged to have been committed by Nigerians murdered in such instances had, on the surface, appeared weighty. Some had also bordered on greed and pettiness of lazy and fringe elements who could not stand the reality of hard working Nigerians making it in their country.
But the issue is that every entity has its own laws and defined codes for rewards and sanctions. In cases of suspected malfeasance or any untoward act by Nigerians or any national for that matter, the minimum expectation is for South African authorities to take the suspects through established judicial system and apportion appropriate punishment, if found guilty.
No administration or country, except a rogue state, would encourage its citizens to transgress the laws of another nation. But to resort to self-help, as the police in South Africa regularly manifest against Nigerians, amounts to impunity and gross violation of relations between the two countries.
The attitude runs against the principles of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights adopted in Nairobi on June 27, 1981 and which entered into force on October 21, 1986. And even the United Nations charter.
But to think that such odious treatment could be meted to Nigerians by the very same South Africa that Nigeria literally opened its vault for and exported its men to ensure its liberation from white minority rule is simply nauseating.
At the height of the decolonisation struggle in southern Africa, particularly the fight against the obnoxious Apartheid system in South Africa, Nigeria staked its men and women to give voice to the oppressed majority in the country.
Even when leading Western countries like America and Britain saw no evil in the atrocious white minority regime in the country, Nigeria rallied other countries in Africa and beyond to ensure justice in South Africa.
Some dire economic decisions were even taken against countries seen to be backing the rogue regime in Pretoria or sitting on the fence. It was in the process that the then Barclays Bank was nationalised and renamed Union Bank, to hit Britain for supporting apartheid. Standard Bank became First Bank, while Shell British Petroleum (BP), was nationalised and renamed African Petroleum (AP).
Elsewhere, student bodies were encouraged in Nigerian universities and other institutions of higher learning to add voice to the agitation against apartheid. Musicians were not left out. In fact, the late Sunny Okosuns earned fame and followership among Nigerians for his trenchant songs against the obnoxious regime.
These were in addition to various regimes of aid and diplomatic support from Nigeria to the freedom fighters in South Africa.
These measures were to haunt Nigeria, years later. It was, in fact, insinuated that it was in a bid to hit back at Nigeria for its audacity over the South Africa debacle that Permanent Member countries of the UN ensured that former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who was Nigeria’s Head of State at the decolonisation era, was humiliated when he vied for the position of Secretary-General of the world body.
It is even suspected that the controversial decision of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the Bakassi Peninsula between Nigeria and Cameroon, where the latter got favourable judgement, may not be entirely divorced from the spill-over effect of Nigeria’s role in South Africa.
But this is where Nigeria is in its relations with South Africa. Aside the routine maltreatment of Nigerians in the country by way of humiliating deportation, unprovoked attacks at their residences and business premises and extra-judicial murder, nothing much can be headlined in the attitude of South Africa to Nigeria.
But who do we really blame in the turn of things? Whether we take it or leave it, no country can treat someone better than his or her country.
The reality of international politics is that the treatment citizens receive from a host nation is a reflection of the treatment they get in their home country.
When a country places high premium in its relations with its nationals, no other state would treat them in lesser terms.
That is why it is only in rare circumstances would security agents of any state manhandle citizens of America, Israel, Germany, Britain or other countries that truly bother about what happens to their nationals. Such incidental instances also attract commensurate consequences.
But for Nigerians abroad, that is not the case. Even the leaders at home take joy in dismissing the citizens as corrupt and criminally-minded, even when there are no evidences to substantiate the blanket ascription.
The country does not show visible concern on the treatment meted to its citizens abroad because it does not treat them better at home.
In the process, many Nigerians are treated shabbily outside, often without genuine reasons. That is why the extra-judicial murder of Ikeri by the South African police may go down without any whimper from the Nigerian government.
That is why the assault on Nigerians in the country and elsewhere will persist. And that is why we shall continue to carry the tag of criminality everywhere, rightly or wrongly. Nobody is exempted, not even the President.
