The Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry
of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Sola Enikanolaye, has said that the Nigerian
students who were arrested in Turkey may have been paying for the refusal of
the Nigerian government to shut down some Turkish schools and institutions in
Nigeria.
This was just as the Charge D’Affaires of
the Nigerian Mission in Turkey, Ibrahim Isah, said that two Nigerian students
had been in detention for more than two months at the Silivri Prisons in
Istanbul, Turkey, for allegedly being members of the Fethulla Terrorist
Organisation, a group said to be responsible for the coup attempt in Turkey.
Some 50 Nigerians studying in Turkey were
reportedly arrested on Friday for an alleged link to a terrorist organisation
in the country.
Many of the Nigerians were said to be
students of Fatih University, one of thousands of schools shut down by the
Turkish government after the failed coup attempt in July.
But in a submission made to the Minister
of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, and obtained on Monday, Enikanolaye
said the plight of the Nigerian students might not be unconnected with the
refusal of the Federal Government to close down some schools in Nigeria “as
arrogantly demanded by the Turkish Government.”
He wrote, “Surely, accusing the students of
links to a terrorist organisation is serious even though we know the state of
paranoid that has beset the leadership of Turkey following the failed coup
attempt. Our students seem to have been caught in the web of internal
politics of Turkey and the clampdown on FETO that was accused of the coup.
“This has severely fractured the country,
putting it on a collision course with the civilised members of the
international community. The action against our students must have been a
reaction to our refusal to close Turkish schools and institutions in Nigeria as
arrogantly demanded by the Turkish Government.’’
Also in a report sent to Onyeama, Isah said
two Nigerian students, Hassan Danjuma Adamu and Muhammad Alhaji Abdullahi, who
are on the scholarship of the Yobe State Government, had completed their programmes
and were waiting for their certificates before their arrest.
According to Isah, the Nigerians’ offence
was that they were living in a hostel facilitated by the International
Students’ Association, an organisation believed to have links with FETO by the
Turkish government.
“According to Mohammad, they were preparing
to vacate the hostel on that fateful day, having heard that the so-called
International Students’ Association was being linked to FETO and that the
hostel was under investigation. Unfortunately for them, the hostel was raided
before they could move out. They believed that the police were given prior
information of the presence of foreign students in the hostel.
“After the raid, nothing implicating was
found on them except three religious books that the police believe were
incriminating. Both denied ownership of the books which seemed to put to rest
any doubts in the minds of the police that they were members of FETO. Thus,
they were immediately arrested and taken to the police station for
interrogation and subsequently transferred to Silivri Prisons.”
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has
explained why it cannot shut down 17 Turkish schools in Nigeria as
requested by the European country.
The government said it could not shut down
17 Turkish schools as requested by the Republic of Turkey, because they were
owned by private individuals who had not been proven to have violated any
Nigerian or international law.
The government stated that closing the
schools would amount to expropriation.
Enikanolaiye said this in an SMS
response to an inquiry following the alleged detention and deportation of some
Nigerian students by Turkey.
The detention was believed to have been
carried out by the Turkish police in retaliation for the refusal of the Federal
Government to accede to the demand of the Turkish ambassador to
Nigeria for the closure of 17 Turkish international schools in the
country for links to the alleged mastermind of the failed coup in Turkey on July
15, 2016.
Enikanolaiye said, “The Federal Government
cannot close schools owned by private individuals that have not been proven to
be in violation of the Nigerian or international laws in our country as doing
so will amount to expropriation of private property.”
Source:The
Punch
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Society