1,100 Nigerian migrants return from Niger Republic by road – NIS

 

No fewer than 1,100 Nigerian migrants have arrived in Kano from Agadez in Niger Republic by road, the Nigeria Immigration Service said on Friday.

It said personnel from multiple federal and state agencies are on the ground to process, counsel and facilitate the returnees’ reintegration with their families.

The Commandant of the Immigration Training School, Kano, Anthony Akuneme, who shared details and videos of the arrival with our correspondent, said the returnees were being documented through the Migration Information and Data Analysis System at the Migrants Arrival, Knowledge and Information Area before proceeding to the International Transit and Stay of Knowledge centre for final profiling, psychosocial counselling and reintegration support.

“Personnel of KNSC, MAKIA and ITSK are fully on ground with other relevant federal and state agencies to ensure hitch-free and safe processing,” Akuneme wrote in a terse statement titled ‘1,100 Nigerian returnees from Agadez, Niger Republic, just landed in Kano by road.’

The Kano Nationality Sortation Centre, MAKIA and ITSK currently serve as the processing corridor through which returning migrants are received, profiled and connected with reintegration services.

The reintegration framework is jointly operated by the NIS, the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, the International Organisation for Migration and state government counterparts.

Friday’s arrival follows a pattern of assisted and spontaneous returns from Agadez, a city in northern Niger Republic that has, for decades, served as the primary waypoint for West African migrants attempting the overland route to Libya and onwards across the Mediterranean to Europe.