'We Drank Urine, Fuel To Survive' - Libyan Returnee

The time was 9.10pm. A Buraq Air’s
Boeing 737 with tail number 5A-DMG
landed on the tarmac of the cargo
terminal of the Murtala International
Airport and out came 20-year-old
Clement Chibuzor, along with 149
other Nigerians whose ghoulish
appearances told of the horrific
experiences they must have
experienced in Libya.

Over the past two weeks, Nigerians have added
their voices to the global uproar over the
exposed tales of slave trade, torture and killings
of migrants in Libya.
Over 5,000 Nigerians have been repatriated
from Libya by the International Organisation
for Migration since the beginning of 2017.
Each time a new batch of returnees arrive, they
bring with them tales of horror from the transit
country, where they hoped to take the
treacherous journey through the Mediterranean
Sea.
Saturday PUNCH spoke with many of the
returnees as they touched down on Thursday
night. They told the tales of man’s inhumanity
to man.
Chibuzor, a Delta State indigene, was just a
teenager working as a Plaster of Paris artisan
when his father met a trafficker, who told him
he could get his son to Europe.
The young lad had worked as a POP artisan for
eight months with little money in his pocket,
his father told him not to worry about the
money.
“I never thought about going to Europe. My
father was the one who brought the idea. He sold
his land and raised N450,000 which he gave to
my ‘burger’ (trafficker). He did not tell my
mother until I was already in Libya,” Chibuzor
said.
The young man spent 18 months in Libya. He
left the country, a hopeful man. On Thursday,
he returned like a mere cargo, thankful to be
back to safety.
As he stepped off the plane, Chibuzor looked
nothing like a 20-year-old.
His hollow cheeks told of starvation while his
skin told of suffering in disease-ridden cells.
“After many of my co-travellers died in the
desert, I was kidnapped as soon as I got to Libya.
I was in prison for four months until my father
sent N300,000 for my release.
“In the prison, our food was a piece of bread
every day. When I got out of the prison. I was on
the street one day when I met a Nigerian who
promised to help me. I worked in his house for
some weeks until he sold me to a gang. They
kept me in a cell. I was there for a very long
time. I cannot count the number of people who
died in the cell.
“The police were raiding different places where
black people were kept and I willingly
surrendered to the police. That was how I got an
opportunity to come back to Nigeria.
“While working on the streets of Libya, if the
gangs saw you, they would grab you and put you
in a cell. They put you in a cell with many others
where you would either be sold or made to call
your people to pay for your freedom.
“While I was trying to get money the to free
myself from the prison, I spoke with my father
two months ago. He then told me that if I had
the chance, I should return home. I told him that
I might die before I had the opportunity to return
home because I saw people die every day.”
We drank urine, fuel in desert – Kelvin, 21
Many of the returnees who shared their
experiences like Chibuzor, vowed never to
attempt the dangerous journey again. But
experts say that so far as there are few success
stories amidst the deaths, some of the returnees
may try again when the shock of their time in
Libya wear off.
Kelvin Sunday, 21, an Edo State indigene, who
returned with Chibuzor, told Saturday
PUNCH that he was in Libya for seven months.
He spent N965,000 to get to Libya after raising
the money with the help of friends and his my
sister.
Sunday explained that a friend of his, who
made it to Europe, convinced him to embark on
the journey.
According to him, 41 of them set out in Kano
for the journey through the desert but only 10
made it to Libya.
He said their fate was sealed when their vehicle
developed an engine fault in the desert.
Sunday said, “ We were in the desert for three
days without food or water. We were drinking
our urine to survive. It got to a point that when
there was no more urine to drink, we started to
drink fuel.
“When we got to Libya, I was working in
my burger’s house. I spent two weeks there
before I went to the seaside (in Tripoli) where we
would cross. From Sabha to the seaside in
Tripoli, I spent two weeks. On the way, some
traffickers kidnapped us. They beat and loaded
us into their Hilux van, but few of us jumped
down and I broke my leg. I managed to escape
as they were shooting.
“We spent two days in the desert again after
that escape. We later saw a motorist whom we
begged to help us get to the seaside.
“We were camped at the seaside for three
months without any opportunity to cross through
the seas. People trying to cross the sea told me
to avoid Nigerians helping Libyans to sell people.
But later our camp was raided by soldiers, who
took us to prison.”
He had spent four months in the cell before
luck smiled on him and IOM officials effected
his repatriation along with many others.
I return home as a one-eyed man – Okotie,
35
Less than a year after Harrison Okotie, 35, got
to Libya, he was kidnapped by some violent
traffickers, who hit him in the eye with the butt
of a gun.
He lost his left eye to that attack.
“Now, I don’t know if my wife and two children
would ever recognise me when I get back home. I
left Nigeria a whole man but I am returning with
one eye,” Okotie said.
He explained that before leaving Nigeria in
2014, he worked as a painter after graduating
from the Delta State University.
After paying N600,000 for the journey through
the desert, he got to Libya where he was
grabbed off the street by some traffickers who
sold him for 2,000 dinars (about N529,000).
“When you got to the person you were sold to,
he sold you again for double the previous
amount.
“Many Nigerians have gone mad and cannot
even say where they are in Libya right now. The
day officials came to register us for repatriation,
we were in a queue when one of the Libyan
officials shot a Nigerian dead right there. They
said he was trying to run, whereas he was
desperate to return home.”
Another returnee, Esosa Osas, 25, who was a
hairdresser before he left Nigeria, spent six
months in Libya. She told tales of many women
being raped.
“It is either rape or death. Nobody could refuse
being raped,” she said.
A fellow Edo State indigene, Odion Saliu, 26,
told Saturday PUNCH that the Nigerian
trafficker who facilitated her trip lied to her.
She said, “She told me that once in Kano, we
were going to take a plane to Libya. I was
shocked when we were loaded into a vehicle.
“We spent nine days crossing the desert to
Libya. I was kidnapped and sold at least three
times before God brought me back to my
fatherland. I am really thankful to God that I am
alive.”
The Nigerian traffickers fueling the trafficking
industry in Libya seems to have attracted the
attention of the government.
The Senior Special Assistant to President
Muhammadu Buhari on Foreign and Diaspora
Affairs, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, said there
was a need for Nigerians to report human
traffickers in the society.
She said the Federal government’s
whistleblower policy against human trafficking
would ensure a handsome reward for credible
information about human traffickers .
“Traffickers must be prosecuted, must be
arrested and they must be known. There is a
whistle-blower policy by NAPTIP; report
traffickers, they are amongst you’
An official of the Edo State task force on illegal
migration, Mr. Okoduwa Solomon, told Saturday
PUNCH that since November 7, the state had
taken custody of at least 897 Libyan returnees
who are indigenes of the state.
He explained that the exercise to help them
resettle in Nigeria would continue so far as
there were still Nigerians trapped in Libya.
“We are using the returnees to raise awareness
about the dangers of illegal migration in Edo
State,” he said. (Punch)