For some, the journey to what could have been
termed- ‘greener pastures’, is the only way to secure a better future; away
from the bleak future that confronts most young people living in Africa. Majority of
these youths, will not make it over to Europe.
The ocean’s bed becomes the
resting-place for a number of youths, some of who were betrayed by agents, who
tricked them out of their countries, with promises of better a future
in Europe. Some were arrested, some were kidnapped and their families extorted and some were sold into slavery. It is as
the saying goes, different tales-of-woe, for different folks.
Roving Informant took to the street of Lagos-Nigeria, to get the thoughts of some young Nigerians in the Ajah axis of Lagos state. Young people were targeted for this interview, because they are
most vulnerable to be lured into this horrendous journey of 'almost' no-return. Whiles sharing their thoughts about what some of them termed: the rush to better life abroad, the Libyan slave market, and experiences of close relatives who embarked on the journey, they gave advise to other young Nigerians and Africans in general and what they think governments should do to help this situation.
A large number of the people interviewed said they are aware of the journey to Europe through Libya, and the hazards that envelops the trip.
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Vox pop session
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Gloria Udo, a lady in her early thirty's, who works with a consultancy Firm, said the youths
who travel to Europe through Libya are simply going in
search for greener pastures. According to her: “if it is well in Nigeria, if
graduates are getting jobs, I don’t think anybody would want to do that. Most
of these people are graduates; it is because the economy has not favored them.
On the other hand, for some of them, it is greed, they are not contented.”
Udo’s advise to the government: “The government should create more employment opportunities, create more jobs, and make the economy favorable for investors. The situation is getting worse; I have never experienced what I experienced this year (2017). Things have never been this hard before seriously, and this is not coming from just one person, the whole country is lamenting. I pray it gets better though”.
Our next interviewee wished to be addressed as ‘Chief, Engineer, Prince Clinton Agu’, a businessperson, has this to say, about Nigerians travelling to Europe through Libya: “I look at it, that they don’t know what they are doing because they don’t value their lives. This is because for somebody to come and tell you that they want to take you through Libya to Europe, you are risking your life. Along the line, anything can happen to you; no security. They can die along the line, and the person becomes a goner, there is no tracer, no investigation. Even your family will not know where the person’s corpse is. However, if you travel legally, there will be evidence, you have your documents, and you can be traced. Travelling through Libya is risky in my understanding. From YouTube videos, I have seen the rescue team save some of these immigrants. Most of them can be attacked, shot, threatened, and sold as slaves. They can even be used for rituals and subject to the worse kind of inhuman treatments. Even the ones that are already dead, we do not really know what becomes of their remains, as the people handling their remains are not their family members. It is risky”.
To curtail this development, Agu advised: “The Nigerian government need to have a re-think and start making things work, if the economy is good, nothing will make our youths to think of traveling out to enslave themselves. If the government can create more jobs for the masses, people will not travel. Instead, the ones that have traveled will start coming back. The system is not working”.
The next person to share his thought on the Libya immigrants' predicament, was a young man, simply identified as Musa, he works with one of the black-market foreign exchange organizations, in Lekki, Lagos.
According to Musa, the challenge is more of psychological. “Mentally, we arrest ourselves psychologically, with the believe that we cannot make it here, until we travel abroad. So most times, we take the illegal means of traveling and risk our lives and our families. I do not really buy that idea of going anywhere to make it because I strongly believe in my country, and that I am going to make it here. To me, being poor is not about not having the cash, it is about not having morals and intellect. Therefore, if you are learned, you have the ability to be rich because you can convert your ideas into use, Nigerians die in Italy and America and other Western countries, it is not only in Libya. It is modern slavery. It is believing that once you travel abroad, you can stand on your feet, only for you to be disappointed. I do not believe it is only in Libya that Blacks are subjected to modern day slavery. It’s the entire West. Young people need to get their acts together, get educated in their preferred fields, because if you are mentally sound, you cannot have that prisoner mentality of ‘travel anywhere".
Musa's opinion on the government: “I think the government is trying, the problem is because we sorely depend on them. I hold a Post-graduate degree, but I do not believe that it is the government that will give me job. I am over here trying to convert my education into money. The United States of America practices Capitalism, whereby the people that holds the money sponsor the people that have the idea. We can do that here. I’m here with my idea working for someone who has the money; with knowledge and persistence, we can work it out together”.
Next, was a 21-year-old man, Gods-will Sunday, who engages on menial jobs, for a living. On travelling abroad, Sunday said: “One of my friends from Benin, Edo state, told me about it. He is planning of generating money for the journey. He told me a particular woman in Benin City, organises the trip, after you have paid her some huge sum of money, I do not know the exact amount. The woman arranges the movement, she take them to Europe through Libya. My friend said, the woman has connections in Libya and even in Europe. He said the woman told him they would cross the Mediterranean Sea on an inflated boat-like big balloon. According to my friend, the woman will bring her people; other agents will equally bring their people. They bring all these people into the big boat balloon and push it into the sea. The big balloon moves with the sea wave, any European country the wave takes it to, that is where those that survived the journey will alight. However, the journey is dangerous because sometimes these people will not get to their destination; accidentally the balloon might burst and all the occupants will be drowned. Sometimes when they survive the dangerous journey, they claim asylum or orphans to generate sympathy from their host countries”. Mr. Sunday’ said he has no idea about the on-going slave trade in Libya, other than what he just narrated. Nevertheless, he said he has been advising his friend against illegal travel to Europe through Libya. “It is very risky,” he said. “If am offered money to embark on such journey, I will not. My advice to other young people like me is that they should not ever think of embarking on such journey. From what we hear, the disadvantage is much more than the advantage. I understand they travel because of the money; due to the high exchange rate of foreign currencies, they travel for greener pastures, to secure a better future and be able to take care of their families.”
Sunday’s thought on government’s efforts: “The government is not doing enough, otherwise the thoughts to travel out for greener pastures, will not come to people’s heads. They travel because they feel the government has not catered for our job needs, so they want to go to where they think the governments will care for them. There is not even an enabling environment for foreigners who have come to invest. The unwritten code of ‘who do you know at the top’ is discouraging investors. The Nigerian government needs to create an enabling environment for investors, because these investors can help create jobs for the teaming unemployed young people. Therefore, my advice is that the government should mobilise the youths. An older man with children will not readily want to embark on the journey to Europe through Libya; it is the young people that are mostly attracted to the journey, because they are desperate to make it. Some young people are not interest in formal education; they just want to be empowered. This can be done through the creation of more jobs and supporting entrepreneurship".
Chizoba Nwanokpara, bread-seller, a young-man in his early twenties, said his younger brother travelled through Libya.
“My junior brother travelled through Libya, he tried travelling legally, but it
didn’t work, so he decided to go illegally. I think it is about the mind, you
have it at the back of your mind that it is a fifty-fifty game. Before my
brother travelled, he prayed. He travelled with seven other young people, out
of which four were arrested. Only three of them made it out of Libya. I gave
him my savings from the meagre job I was doing, to add to what he had, before
he left for Libya. On getting to Libya, he was stuck. Again, I sent him all I
saved, our father sold his car and sent the proceeds to enable him leave Libya,
because the story he told us over the phone, of happenings there was troubling.
We sold everything we had to enable him leave Libya. Fortunately, he left
Libya. We hear Nigerians stranded in Libya are crying and looking for ways to
come back, due to what they are passing through. I wish they did not have to
travel; their suffering here in the country would not have been that bad".
Chizoba's advise to Nigerian government: “I will want the Nigerian government to focus on the youths. Truly, some of us could not go beyond secondary school education level, due to lack of funds and sponsors, in as much as we would have loved to; the government needs to assist us. I am not from this part of the country. I sell bread to survive." I do not even have a house; I sleep under this bridge. It is because we the young people, do not have any other alternative, that most of us, out of desperation embark on these dangerous journeys. We need proper jobs and empowerment to pursue our dreams".
A recent outcry against modern day slavery particularly in Libya, where African migrants are reportedly being sold for as low as $400, was the thrust of the recently concluded two-day African Union/ European Union Summit, held in Abidjan, Ivory Coast-West Africa. About 83 Heads of States were in attendance.
As a result of the summit, French President, Emmanuel Macron, announced the launching of the EU-AU "concrete military and policing action", to arrest human traffickers and rescue African migrants enslaved in Libya. The EU made a €44 billion "Marshall Plan for Africa" pledge.
Fayez al-Serraj, Libyan President, pledged his government's consent and assistance into identified camps, where these inhuman acts are perpetrated. Coming days or weeks is expected to witness the evacuation of affected individuals willing to return to their home countries.
We round-off with this video:
