The Chairman/CEO of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, has informed the Senate Joint Committees on Diaspora and InterGovernmental Affairs and Foreign Affairs that the employer of Ikem, a Nigerian student beaten to death in the Philippines, has been charged with murder, along with five others.
Dabiri-Erewa also spoke on the content of a viral video that 250 Nigerians are slated for killing in Ethiopia.
These were the highlights of the investigative hearing of the Joint Senate Committees presided over in Abuja on Monday by Senator Victor Umeh, saying in the case of Ikem, who was brutally murdered, the Philippine authorities have declared the employer, who has since been on the run, wanted.
Dabiri-Erewa said the Nigeria Embassy had informed the Department of Foreign Affairs in the Philippines and also reported the case to the Inspector General of the Philippines National Police.
The Embassy, she added, had maintained regular contact with the line police station at the location, with a strong directive to go for the investigation.
She said the investigating police team on the case are done with evidence building and presented the case to the Mandaue city prosecuting department for action, which has evaluated it and deemed it fit for murder case filing.
She added: “They have filed the case and issued a warrant of arrest to the boy’s employer and five other suspects.
“They are charged for murder, human trafficking and operation of illegal business in the Philippines.”
The NiDCOM boss, who gave the committee a copy of the pictures of the suspects, said the pictures have been forwarded to all exits in the Philippines to prevent them from leaving the country.
She stressed that the case will be heard as soon as the major suspect, still at large, is arrested.
On Nigerians in Ethiopian prisons, Dabiri-Erewa said the official information received is that 160 Nigerians were serving various jail terms under very poor conditions and that over 90 percent of them were for drug related offences.
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She told the Committees that in order to decongest the prisons, amnesty was granted to them, but the majority of them went back and still committed the same crime.
She said that a Memorandum of Understanding was entered into, awaiting the Ministry of Justice in Nigeria to sign its own side of the deal to enable prisoners swap or to continue their jail term in their respective countries.
In addition, she explained that most of those caught are those transiting from Addis Ababa to other countries of the world.
Other stakeholders who appeared before the Committees were Ambassador Enya Francis, Director, Consular, representing the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; sister of Ikem, Blessing Essien; President, National Association of Nigeria Students, John Ogar; and Country Representative, Commonwealth Students Association, Nwanba Chidubem.
Speaking in the same vein, Francis said they are in close contact with the Embassy and on top of the matter.
Francis said Ikem was yet to be buried as it will cost between N31 million and N35 million to repatriate and bury the corpse in Nigeria as against N10 million to N15 million to cremate it in the Philippines.
He said the cost of keeping the corpse at the funeral home is accruing N30,000 on daily basis, hence the need to expedite action on the investigation and take appropriate action.
Speaking on behalf of the family of the deceased, Essien, Ikem’s elder sister, said he was the only son of the family and in line with Igbo tradition, it would be an honour to bring the body back to Nigeria for burial.
She therefore appealed to the Federal Government through the Senate Committees to assist the family in repatriating the body back to Nigeria for a befitting burial.
Ogar said the group was troubled by the dastardly and wicked manner in which the late Ikem was killed and seeking for justice.
He and Chiduben said apart from the protest they embarked upon to seek justice for the death of Ikem, they have written to Governor Charles Soludo of Anambra State to assist the family in bringing back the corpse home for burial, while appealing to some foreign airlines plying the route to see it as a Corporate Social Responsibility in flying the corpse home.
Senator Umeh thanked all the stakeholders for their efforts, saying the investigative hearing was sequel to a motion he moved on the floor of the Senate and the joint committees were mandated to investigate the matter.
He assured that the Committees will ensure that all those involved will be prosecuted and face the music, saying the matter would never be swept under the carpet.
Ikem, a Nigerian student based in the Philippines, was on October 22, 2023 tortured by a group of Chinese co-workers over a minor disagreement with his supervisor.
“They tied his hands up, covered and tied his mouth and beat him until he gave up the ghost,” an eye witness said in a statement.
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