Police Hand over 26 Illegal Aliens to Immigration in Edo 

Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City

The Nigeria Police, Edo State Command has handed over 26 illegal aliens that were arrested in the state to the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) for interrogation.

The illegal aliens were said to have been intercepted last week at Ayua near Auchi, headquarters of  Etsako West Local Government Area of the state.

Spokesman of the Edo State Police Command, Chidi Nwabuzor, who disclosed this yesterday in Benin City, said that the foreigners were moved to the custody of the Edo State Command of NIS, Benin City on Monday, November 13, 2023.

Nwabuzor, a superintendent of police, said that when the aliens were quizzed, it was discovered that they could not effectively communicate in English except to identify their countries of origin.

According to him, “They (aliens) confessed that a certain young man brought them to Nigeria through the Cameroon border.”

He added that the 26 migrants comprised16 males and eight females from Cameroon while the remaining two, a male and a female from Burkina Faso, were reportedly arrested at Ayua-Uzaire, Etsako West Local Government Area of Edo State on November 9th, 2023.

The Nigerian, who claimed to have lived and worked in Cameroon for years, simply identified himself as an excavator operator and confessed to having brought the foreigners to the country to join in excavation work at the small Edo town.

The spokesman of NIS, Edo Command, Mr. Ki Ake, is yet to comment on the issue but checks at the NIS Edo headquarters in Benin City, however, revealed that the 26 migrants have been kept in a special facility of the service pending thorough investigations.

A source at NIS disclosed that the Comptroller of Immigration in Edo has directed that the illegal migrants should be screened, profiled and documented.

He said their arrest followed credible intelligence received by the DPO of Jattu divisional police headquarters.