The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, has said that the federal government spent $1 million to evacuate Nigerians who were stranded in Russia after the 2018 FIFA World Cup tournament.

The first batch of 155 stranded Nigerians arrived in the country on July 20, while the last batch of 200, arrived Nigeria on Sunday, August 5.

Onyeama told journalists on Monday in Abuja that $500,000 was spent to charter each of the two planes that airlifted the stranded football fans.

“About 200 of them were brought back yesterday (Sunday) at a cost of one million US dollars to the country. $500,000 to charter the first plane and another $500,000 for the second,” he said.

That same plane also brought back 17 Ghanaians, who were then transported to their country, the minister said, adding that the gesture, again, demonstrated Nigeria’s big brother role in Africa.

The minister, however, expressed concern that large number of Nigerians travelled to Russia not to watch the world cup but went there for other purposes.

“They ostensibly went to Russia as football fans to watch the world cup but unfortunately, large number of them did not go there to watch football at all,” he said.

He said the cost of evacuation was “a lot of money” at a time the country is battling with the challenge of scarce resources.

“We have to try and stop this continuous wave of Nigerians trying at all cost to get to European countries in an irregular manner,” he added.

The stranded football fans had claimed that travel agents cancelled their return tickets.

Onyeama said he had directed Nigerian Ambassador in Russia to collect all the tickets and make them available to the ministry

“We will take the matter up with the travel agents and get to the bottom of it,” he said.

•Culled from a Daily Trust report

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