•Mercy Oluwagbenga
An undergraduate, Mercy Oluwagbenga, who was recently rescued from Libya, has said that she was beaten and forced to donate blood for the sick mother of her employee in the North African country.
Oluwagbenga, who spoke on Channels TV today, also narrated how she was trapped in Libya and worked without pay.
“The first place I worked was okay within three months. The first month, I asked them for my salary, and they said that they wouldn’t give it to me until their dad came back because he was supposed to pay me. The second month, the same thing happened — they said their dad would be back the next month, which was the third month. So, in my mind, I figured they were saving it for me.
“The third month their father came back, I started asking for my salary, but they wouldn’t reply to me, they wouldn’t do anything. So, they started withdrawing my blood because their mom was sick.
“I thought it was normal at first because when you’re working at an Arab’s house, you have to do some tests every three months for them to be sure that you are okay. But it started becoming consistent.
“I noticed that it was the same nurse who was treating their mother who kept withdrawing my blood without taking me to the hospital. I refused to let them take my blood; that’s when the beating started,” Oluwagbenga, who hails from Kabba in Kogi State, said during the interview.
She explained that several efforts she made to get help did not yield good results.
“I tried calling my agent, who took me there, and later found out he was in prison. I tried to run, but there was no space to run because I was locked up, so there was no way I could get out.
“The day I tried to escape, the door was unlocked because I was doing something in the house. I didn’t know they were monitoring me because I was looking at the person who was going to pick me up. That’s when they double-crossed me. They beat me till I fainted.
“At that time, I had a phone, but they changed my SIM card every month, so I didn’t have a stable SIM card, and the only reason they let me use my phone was that I was taking care of their sick mother so that they could call and check in on her,” she stated.
The head of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM), Abike Dabiri-Erewa, had commended Oluwagbenga for her courage and survival, describing her as “one of the lucky ones,” as many others had died in the desert or the Mediterranean Sea, while some remained untraceable.
Dabiri-Erewa maintained that irregular migration was tantamount to “voluntary suicide” and advised young Nigerians to always seek safe and legal channels for travel.
She also said that NiDCOM would facilitate the returnee’s full rehabilitation.
