The Senate, on Wednesday, revealed that many foreign prisoners were working in construction firms in Nigeria, noting that some of them live inside containers.
This was as the Ministry of Interior claimed to have surpassed its budgetary target of N600 million in revenue from the issuance of expatriate quotas in the 2023 fiscal year by raking in N1.195 billion from January to October this year.
On foreign prisoners, the Chairman, of the Senate Committee on Interior, Senator Adams Oshiomhole, made the revelation when the Minister of Interior, Mr. Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo led top officials of his Ministry and heads of agencies under his supervision to defend their 2024 budget proposal before the National Assembly Joint Committee on Interior.
While expressing concerns over the situation, Oshiomhole asked the Minister to pay more attention to the issue of these illegal expatriates smuggled into the country.
Oshiomhole said, “Your ministry needs to regulate the issuance of the quotas very well as I have it on good authority that prisoners from foreign land are working in Nigeria as construction workers.
“This is even different from the agelong fraud the oil companies have been carrying out in the country through the policy of expatriate quotas by making our qualified engineers work under foreign technicians.
“Many non-Nigerians are in the country, some of them live inside containers. I even believe and dare say that there are foreign prisoners who are working in Nigeria. They were shipped to our country to serve their prison terms.
“They were being paid according to their country’s minimum wage by the construction industry that brought them. I don’t want to mention the company’s name but if I am provoked, I will mention them.”
