Published 27th Aug, 2022

By Tola Owoyele

A Nigerian migrant simply identified as Godwin has narrated how he was apprehended by law enforcement officers in Libya while trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Italy.

The 34-year-old Nigerian said he paid €1,100, about N463,000, to smugglers to get him across the sea in an overcrowded boat.

“I just wanted to go to Europe and have a good life,” Godwin said. The Nigerian also said he considered jumping into the sea in a bid to escape the Libyan authorities when the boat he boarded was intercepted.

After the arrest, he and other migrants were returned to Libya where they spent days in detention.

Choosing not to elaborate on his experiences while in detention, the Nigerian accused the European Union-backed Libyan authorities of committing acts of “extreme abuse” against captured migrants.

He also said that his family members had to pay a €550 ransom, about N231,000, before he was released from detention. He considered the ransom payment a form of extortion, saying he would save up money to try to get to Europe once more.

“Now, I’m just in Libya, suffering. There is no work, no food to eat, nothing,” he said.

“I’m tired of living this kind of life I’m living here.”

Recently, several NGOs and media organisations detailed and condemned the brutal human rights abuses at migrant detention centres in the war-ravaged country.

In early August, the Human Rights Watch NGO revealed that 32,450 people were intercepted by Libyan authorities in 2021 and “hauled back to arbitrary detention and abuse”.

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