A family of four, with the youngest as little as 11 years were recently deported from Germany with their mother who is a single parent. This happened after about a decade of living in the western European country.
The Ovbiagele family, namely Godsand, Victor, Miracolo, Victoria and their mother Bose are now reportedly living in a single room in Benin City, Edo State, after testing the beauty of the western world.
The forced return to Nigeria dispossessed them of everything they ever had in Germany, leaving them with just “A tennis racquet, a pair of soccer cleats, a bible, a pencil case.”
On the evening of 15th May, the Ovbiagele family resident in Kempten, southern Germany was reportedly invaded at night by the German police, who forcefully took them away, according to a report by a German news magazine, Spiegel.
“The police officers came into my room at night and woke me up. I was shaking. They said: ‘You will be deported. Pack your things, but only what you can manage.’ We weren’t allowed to talk to mommy.
“We were afraid. I heard Victoria cry in her room”, 11-year-old Godsand is quoted as saying in a recent article in the Spiegel magazine.
The morning after this inversion, the children and their mother were deported to Nigeria in a chartered flight. In the same flight, which took off from Frankfurt airport were also many other deportees who were also Nigerians.
These other Nigerians numbering 35 were captured around other German cities and from three other European countries – Austria, Luxembourg, Sweden.
The German news magazine, Spiegel, describes Benin as “a center of human trafficking and forced prostitution and is considered to be one of the most dangerous places in Nigeria.”
Bose Ovbiagele, the mother of the 5 children left Nigeria as a single mother after separating with her second husband. She went into the second marriage after her the first husband died.
According to her she relocated to Europe with her family because her children had no future in Nigeria.
Reacting to their fate following the deportation, 14-year-old Miracolo says “I don’t know if I can find friends here. “I don’t feel safe here. There are people stealing and kidnapping people; they have guns, too.”
“Before Germany, I cannot remember anything. We were still young. I don’t know any other country,” 17-year-old Victor told the Spiegel.
“I was about to get my diploma,” Victor’s twin sister Victoria said. “I was already in tenth grade and had completed my oral examinations. I lived in Germany for almost nine years. Was this all in vain?” He asked.
The Ovbiagele’s family reportedly lost their asylum application to remain in German in 2016 according to the report. Since then, they have been on a list of immigrants who must mandatorily be removed from Germany.
