by Ranti Joseph

The Nigeria Immigration Service, Oyo State Command, on Thursday arrested 164 illegal immigrants in the Ibadan metropolis with National Identity Cards and Permanent Voters Cards recovered from some of them.

Controller of the command, Innocent Akatu, said the arrested men and women were residing in Nigeria without valid documents adding that they arrived in Nigeria from Niger Republic, Benin Republic, Togo and other countries in West Africa.

One of the ID cards belonged to Musa Abdullahi Tanko, who claimed to have come from Kandan Village in Tangaza council area of Sokoto State.

PVC was issued to one Garba Muhammed, who claimed to be a farmer from the same area as Tanko in Sokoto State. PVCs were also issued to Ibrahim Idris and Magaji Muntaru from the same place in Sokoto State.

It was discovered that the date of birth on the cards was January 01, but with different years.

“In the past, we have invited leaders of ECOWAS communities in Nigeria to brief them on the forthcoming elections and why they should not participate in the electoral process or apply for the National Identity Card. We also told them that they should refrain from being used by the politicians in any capacity. Those who do not have valid travelling document are not supposed to be in Nigeria; they are to be flushed out and that is what we are doing now. We are fishing out the illegal immigrants and repatriating them back to their countries. Whatever we are doing is in line with ECOWAS protocol. We are also doing this because elections are fast approaching; we have to make sure that illegal settlers are forced out of Nigeria. From the present exercise, we have arrested 164 illegal settlers and recovered National Identity cards and Permanent Voter Cards from some of these arrested foreigners. We have seized all these and you will agree with me that the foreigners are being used,” Akatu said.

Janeth J