•Government and citizens have roles in tackling migration-related swindlers

Astriking number of desperate Nigerians fleeing their country in search of greener pastures have fallen prey to racketeers. The United Nations agency on migration affairs, the International Organisation of Migration (IOM), lately said more than 1,000 Nigerians were deceived by fraudulent job offers in the United Kingdom, on which basis they obtained work visas out of Nigeria, only to get stranded in that foreign land. IOM Chief of Mission Laurent De Boeck, speaking at a news conference in Abuja, advised Nigerians to seek genuine and accurate information before migrating.

Boeck said: “There are some of them who lost over $10,000, only to be given fake employment letters, which allowed them to get visas. They get there, present the letters, and the organisations tell them that the letters did not emanate from the organisations. Over a thousand people are affected.” Those Nigerians are consequently stranded, he added, because some of them lack the means to return to Nigeria, while others are ashamed of going back defeated.

The IOM chief further disclosed that over 260,000 Nigerians approached the agency in 2023 seeking guidance on how to migrate through regular or approved routes. He also said the migration agency was working with partners to repatriate thousands of people, including Nigerians, from Tunisia, which recently placed a ban on migrants.

The alarming picture corroborated a report, in August, that scores of Nigerians had fallen into destitution in the UK after leaving their native land on skilled worker visas with which they had hoped to make a living abroad. Many of them emptied their savings to pay ‘agents’ who promised them job placements upon relocation; but contrary to their expectations, these Nigerians ended up on UK streets begging for food, shelter and other basic needs.

A Sky News report showed Nigerians who said they paid agents – effectively, visa middlemen – who got them skilled worker visas and documents indicating job offers that they found to be phony upon arrival in the UK. With no job, they have no means of sustenance, and are struggling to survive by sleeping rough and begging for food from humanitarian food banks.

A victim who spoke to Sky News said she relocated to the UK after paying an agent £10,000 to get her a job as a carer, which, upon arriving in the country, she found to be non-existent contrary to assurances by the agent. Another victim, who said she was destitute in the UK, showed her passport and other documents proving her claim of having been offered a job that she eventually found to be phony. She was advised against taking the matter up with the agency that swindled her for fear of legal repercussions. “Their pathetic stories attest to how agents or middlemen are manipulating Nigerians desperate to travel out of the country with the skilled worker visa system, who have been promised opportunities only to find out that such do not exist,” the report had said.

As we argued concerning the Sky News report, Nigerians getting stranded in foreign lands should serve as a warning against the blind flight – known as ‘japa’ syndrome – of compatriots from their country owing to prevailing anomie at home. Migration should happen after fully ascertaining the prospects ahead. In other words, whatever may be the motivation, risks involved in leaving one’s country must be well calculated and prepared for. And migration must be by official channels and procedures only, not by use of middlemen or other illegal routes.

But it is also high time the Nigerian government engaged its UK counterpart in tackling the swindlers. It is curious, for instance, that UK consular officials failed to detect documents making fake job offers in their country before issuing work visas on the strength of such. Internally, the Federal Government, through the Foreign Affairs Ministry and National Orientation Agency, among others, should intensify public enlightenment on the issue.

The ultimate solution is for the government to make living conditions conducive at home so as to render the allure of greener pastures less potent, and desperation for migration less intense.

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