Reps To Probe Immigration Recruitment Test Deaths

The House of Representatives, yesterday,
resolved to probe the circumstances
surrounding the death of 21 job applicants
during last Saturday aptitude test for
recruitment into the Nigeria Immigration
Service, NIS.
It also resolved that families of the victims
should be given automatic employment,
provided they were qualified.
The House also mandated its Committee on
National Security and Public Safety to
investigate last Saturday’s killings of over 100
residents in a Southern Kaduna village,
directing the committee in plenary to carry out
the assignment within two weeks and report
back.
Four committees, including those on Interior,
Justice, Public Service Matters and Labour
and Productivity, were mandated to
investigate the matter and report to the House
within four weeks.
This development was sequel to a motion
brought to the floor of the House by Sunday
Karimi, PDP, Kogi State, under matters of
national importance.
In the motion, entitled, ‘Tragedy at 2014
immigration exercise in which one million
Nigerian youths scrambled for 4,500 job
placements,’ Karimi had given a graphic detail
with figures of how the aptitude test was
conducted in almost all the state capitals.
“On March 15, 2014, over one million Nigerian
youths trooped into all the nation’s state
capitals and other major cities to participate
in the 2014 Nigerian Immigration Service
recruitment, for which the Service had in
September, 2013, advertised positions into it
and had obtained N1000 as application fee
from each of the applicants,” he said.
He explained that in Lagos alone, about
70,000 youths showed up at the stadium for
the test, adding that in Ibadan, the Liberty
Stadium played host to about 20,000.
According to him, .the 60,000 capacity
National Stadium in Abuja was over-crowded
with 70,000 youths, while 25,000 candidates
showed up like a sea of heads at llorin
Stadium in Kwara State.
Karimi said: “In Benin, at the Samuel
Ogbemudia Stadium, 26,000 youths trooped in
all in a bid to write the aptitude test.
”The Sani Abacha Stadium in Kano played
host to 15,800; Benue, 17,800 and Port
Harcourt, about 23,000 candidates.
”Despite the crises and insecurity in the North
East, Gombe and Borno State played host to
about 5,000 applicants each, while in Sokoto
State, 10,000 applicants participated in the
exercise.
”This resulted in chaos and stampede in all
the centres and several persons were reported
dead and many more critically injured. At
least, about 21 deaths were reported.
”In Benin, three pregnant women lost their
lives; in Abuja, eight candidates, including two
men and six women, died at the venue.
“In Port Harcourt, five corpses, including that
of a pregnant woman, were recovered at the
scene. In Calabar, Ogun, Lagos and at many
other centres, candidates, all in a bid to
secure a white collar job, were flogged and
abused by security personnel. Many slept at
the venues, a night preceding the exercise.
”An unrecorded number of Nigerians had lost
their lives in motor accidents on their way to
the test centres.
“The National Bureau of Statistics ,NBS, states
that 54 per cent of Nigerian youths are
unemployed and puts Nigeria’s total
unemployment at 23.9 per cent.
Karimi had in his motion, prayed the House to
condemn unequivocally, handling of the
recruitment of the Nigerian Immigration
Service of March 15, 2014, and commiserate
with the families of applicants who lost their
lives and also empathise with those who
suffered injuries as a result of the exercise.
He also said the Comptroller General of the
Immigration Service and the Minister of
Interior must appear before the House to
explain the unwieldy recruitment of March 15,
2014, adding that the Federal Government
should work in conjunction with state, local
governments and public spirited individuals
and organisations to evolve a job creation
scheme that would best address the
unemployment situation in Nigeria.
He canvassed a micro-credit scheme, Nigerian
Youth Empowerment Programme, to assist
Nigerian youths keenly interested in handcraft
and small businesses, in order to, at least,
immortalise those who lost their lives.
The Speaker, Aminu Tambuwal, at this
juncture, called for debates on the issue, but
members sought an amendment that the
Committee on Human Rights should be
dropped for Labour and Productivity and this
was carried.