Nigeria’s Potential Illegal Immigrants And The Struggle In EU Member States

When an individual (name intentionally withheld) approached AllNews Nigeria’s investigative reporter that he would pay him handsomely if he could write a report indicating that he was a victim of the Owo massacre because he wanted to use the report as an escape route to Europe, the reporter wondered but understood that it is one of the cruel ways Nigerians are using to “Japa” from the country.

Our reporter did not subscribe to the deal for integrity reasons, but the young man could take his swollen ideas to another platform and get his wishes.

Without mincing words, the country is unencouragingly harsh on the citizens but does not translate into doing the unthinkable to “join the japa train”.

The European Union leaders have agreed on stricter rules to make it easier to expel asylum-seekers whose refugee applications are denied, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said on Friday.

The measures respond to increasing European concern over rising irregular immigration, which has become a hot-button issue in several member countries.

That is the reality in Nigeria and some other developing countries where the people desperately seek asylum and remain a public property of the country without documenting themselves legitimately.

That problem is “a European challenge that requires a European response,” EU leaders said in a final document at the end of a 16-hour summit.

Because Nigeria is becoming a violent-prone area, Nigerians seek asylum in European countries.

Even those who have no affiliation with the affected areas use the strategy. 

Subsequently, they will not return home and disappear, trying to find another means to keep moving.

The low number of failed asylum-seekers being returned to their home countries is a central preoccupation for the European Union.

Europe has become the home of refugees. Citizens of embattled countries such as Ukraine, Syria and Afghanistan, alongside safer countries such as Bangladesh, Turkey and Tunisia, Nigerian fill-up Europe.

Von der Leyen said “pilot projects” relying on the EU’s border patrol, asylum and police cooperation agencies would look to instill “fast and fair asylum procedures” at the bloc’s external borders.

The EU leaders called on the commission “to immediately mobilise substantial EU funds” to reinforce that external border with “protection capabilities and infrastructure, means of surveillance, including aerial surveillance, and equipment,” according to the summit document.

That decision came after some EU countries, notably Austria, had pushed the commission to pay for reinforced fences designed to keep irregular migrants crossing from neighbouring non-EU nations such as Turkey.

Von der Leyen has repeatedly said EU funds would not pay for fences.

But EU officials and diplomats pointed out that if Brussels paid for cameras, watch towers and other infrastructure along the external border, that would free up countries to pour their national budgets into paying for fences.

The summit also agreed on a “principle” under which one EU country can use a court decision in another EU member state to return an irregular migrant to their home country.

That would prevent “asylum shopping”, whereby migrants go to a different country to apply to stay after being turned down in an initial one.

The EU leaders also agreed “to increase the use of the safe-country concepts” that will open the way to the bloc formulating a common list, von der Leyen said.

Nigerians and citizens from other countries banking on the insecurity situation of their countries to pack themselves into EU member states will devise newer measures if they want to continue their illegal migration.