Prior to their evacuation to Nigeria, Nigerians who are trapped in the United Arab Emirates are now being profiled.
Following the UAE authorities’ wholesale deportation of foreigners, a viral video showed thousands of people sitting in an open area with their bags and luggage.
Abike Dabiri-Erewa, the chairman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, met journalists in Abuja on Friday and stated that the profiling being done by the Nigerian Consulate in Dubai was essential to getting complete information on the Nigerians living there before evacuating them.
She said, “Immediately, the attention of the Nigerian Consulate in Dubai was drawn to the issue, Nigerians there are being profiled. Some of them have passports and some do not. There are some children that do not have any form of identification. Some do not even remember the names with which they entered the country originally. So they need to be profiled. It is also important to ensure that some have not committed a crime and they are just running.
“So, what the consulate is doing now is profiling everybody at the holding centre. Initially, at the airport, there was a fake WhatsApp message sent to everybody that there were flights that led to the rush to the airport. There were quite a lot of Africans.”
The NiDCOM chairman also explained that “It is after the profiling that the consulate will make a decision on the next step to take. The consulate and the embassy will brief the Federal Government on the next step to take.”
