Nigerians held in a deportation camp in Libya have raised the alarm over inhumane conditions, calling on the Nigerian government and private organisations for urgent intervention.
In a viral video, a middle-aged man narrated the ordeal of Nigerians crammed into a holding facility reportedly run by a United Nations agency. Recall that the Chairman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM), Abike Dabiri-Erewa, had announced that over 956 Nigerians were evacuated from Libya in the first quarter of 2025, warning against illegal migration.
NiDCOM spokesperson, Abdur-Rahman Balogun, in a statement earlier in the year, noted that the evacuation was made possible through the collaborative efforts of the International Organisation for Migration Nigeria and the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants, and Internally Displaced Persons.
In the viral video, the narrator decried that they had been confined to the camp for over seven months while awaiting deportation. According to him, the number of detainees had dropped from about 700 to 400, with many allegedly dying due to maltreatment and poor living conditions.
“People are dying almost every day,” he lamented.
According to him, the distressed detainees are pleading for swift rescue, describing the camp’s condition as unbearable and life-threatening. He said: “These are Nigerians as you are watching this video, it is a clear picture of what we are passing through in Libya, today being the 5th day of August. For over seven months that we have been in this so-called deportation camp, dying in numbers, both children, adults, teenagers and women.
“When you take a close look at this video, it will explain the conditions that Nigerians are in, right here in Libya, in a place called Brakchat, 60 kilometres away from Sabh.”
And as we are watching this video, it is at our own expense because we are restricted from using phones.
“You can see how Nigerians have been lying here for over seven months. And this is how we keep lying, and we keep counting dead souls daily. Even as of yesterday, we lost a child and a teenager here because of maltreatment and the punishments we are going through here.”
He said the video was meant to serve as a wake-up call for Nigeria to intervene in the situation, disclosing that the number of Nigerians in the camp was approximately 400, though they were about 700 when they got there.
“Please, we have to do this video as proof to Nigeria over what we are passing through here. If you watch this video, you will see some of us are bandaged. Some of us cannot even bring our hands down because of the casualties and injuries that we have sustained,” he added.