Nigerians Migrating Have Nothing Here, Going Anywhere they Can Get It – Obasanjo

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has made a clarion call for worsening insecurity, unemployment and poverty in Nigeria, to be addressed warning that leadership failures are compelling citizens to seek better opportunities abroad, often through life-threatening routes. adsbygoogle || []).push({});

He spoke on Saturday during a panel session with the theme: “Lest We Forget” at the Creative Africa Nexus Weekend 2026, organised by the African Export-Import Bank in Lagos State.

Obasanjo recalled an incident of Nigerians being arrested for drug-related offences abroad with one of the suspects citing his involvement due to loss of legitimate employment. He further revealed interacting with Africans who attempted to reach Europe through the Sahara Desert and the Mediterranean Sea:

“I have got those people who have attempted to cross, and the story they told me is pathetic. Some die in the Sahara, some die in the Mediterranean.”

“We have to improve our leadership to deliver, and once our leadership delivers, what does any man want in the world?

“But if they have nothing here, they will look for whatever they can get anywhere else, and you can’t blame them.”

He also reflected on Nigeria’s security situation since independence, saying governance failures were responsible for declining safety and economic fortunes.

“We just have to do what we should do to provide job opportunities, to stem the tide of impunity, to stem the tide of poverty, to stem the tide of kidnapping and insecurity,” he said.

Looking at the past with nostalgia, he said:

“I came back to this country after my commission as an officer in Britain in 1959. And I could go anywhere; I was posted to the North; I could go anywhere in the North, by myself alone, by day, by night.

He called for more freedom of movement across Africa, disclosing discussions with Ghanaian President John Mahama on a proposal to eliminate visa requirements among approximately 25 African countries.

“These countries should eliminate visas among themselves, about 25 of them, and if they can do it successfully, then maybe in a matter of a few years, the whole of Africa will be able to move.

“I believe that all African states should have such a policy. That anybody from the diaspora who wants to be a national of any African country should automatically be given.”

The former Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr Ralph Gonsalves, and Jamaican scholar, Prof. Paulette Ramsay, also featured at the session which examined African identity, slavery, colonialism, reparations and the need for stronger connections between Africa and its diaspora.

The three speakers called for reparatory justice over the trans-Atlantic slave trade and colonialism, arguing that the historical exploitation of Africans continued to affect the continent’s development, among other things.

Ramsay, author of “Lest We Forget: Slavery, Slave Trade, Colonisation, Emancipation and Reparation,” paid glowing tribute to Obasanjo for backing the publication, which was witnessed by scholars, policymakers and cultural experts to examine Africa’s historical experiences.

She argued that reparations should extend beyond monetary compensation to include the return of stolen artefacts, stronger protection of African cultural heritage and an end to the continuing exploitation of the continent’s natural resources. In her view:

“We must not remember with bitterness. We must teach younger generations that we remember the horrible things that were done, but we survived, and that’s the best part of the African story, that we survived.”