About 50 Nigerian students in Turkey were arrested allegedly by the Turkish government in connection to the failed coup that occurred in the country a while ago.
According to Thisday, a source alleged that “upon arrival at Ataturk International Airport in Istanbul, they were all escorted to a room and their passport confiscated by Turkish police.”
The Nigerians were mostly students of Fathi University in Turkey. The University has a large number of International students since its inception in 1996.
Thisday reports that the source said; “When they enquired why they were clamped in a dirty room, the police said they are students of a terrorist organisation. They offered to transfer them to government schools but on the condition that we will pay same fees as private universities,”
Officials from the Turkish government have said that schools such as Fathi University along with many other schools which were shut down in the wake of the coup were terrorist schools due to alleged links with Islamic scholar Fethullah Gulen who is said to be the brains behind the failed coup.
Thisday obtained some pictures showing the students who were arrested lying on the floor in a badly kept room.
The source also talked about the case of a Nigerian by name Aminat, a final year student in one of the universities affected by the closure at the time of the coup.
“Aminat came to the airport to travel to Nigeria since her school had been shut, but to her surprise, she was asked to pay a penalty for entering the country illegally. She paid the fine, and she was kept, alongside others in the same room with people waiting to be deported.” the source said.
Thisday reports that the students detained at the airport were compelled to sign documents that would have them deported from Turkey.
Clarification is still needed on the story as attempts to find out why the students were detained have so far been rebuffed.