Two children of the 68 year old former Prime Minister of the Republic of Niger, Hama Amodou that were smuggled into Nigeria, have been picked up in Sokoto and are said to be in detention at the office of Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), in the nation’s Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
The children were said to have been adopted by Amodou that had since fled and gone on exile in France, through his wife that is currently in detention in the Republic of Niger.
Information reaching us at Greenbarge Reporters indicated that the children, whose names have not been made public, were brought into Nigeria, through Sokoto, by the foreign diplomat of the sacked Prime Minister to Cameroon. The name of the diplomat was given as Alhaji Tati.
It was gathered that the idea of bringing the two adopted children of Amodou to Nigeria was to naturalize their nationality by obtaining Nigerian passports for them, and then enrolling them in schools in Nigeria.
Hama Amadou was Prime Minister of Niger from 1995 to 1996 and again from 2000 to 2007. He was also Secretary-General of the National Movement for the Development of Society (MNSD-Nassara) from 1991 to 2001 and President of the MNSD-Nassara from 2001 to 2009.
Amadou is from the Kurtey, a Fula sub-group, and was raised in the Tillaberi Region, in the Niger River valley, North of Niamey.
As a result of corruption allegations against his government, he was removed from office as Prime Minister through a 2007 no-confidence vote in the National Assembly.
In 2008, he became the target of a corruption investigation which saw him arrested to face criminal charges at the Nigerien High Court of Justice and removed from his post as MNSD President.
Amadou fled Niger in August 2014 to escape arrest on charges related to a baby-trafficking investigation. Upon those charges, Amadou was sentenced to one year in prison, in March 2017, by the Niamey Court of Appeals.
Amadou was tried in absentia, since he was exiled in France
Greenbarge Reporters gathered that the wife of the sacked Prime Minister was also sentenced to years of imprisonment which she is serving presently in the Republic of Niger.
As at the time of going to press, no statement has been made on the two children of the sacked Prime Minister of Niger that were intercepted in Sokoto, as officials of the Nigerian Immigration Service are keeping sealed lips.
Though it was learnt that the Nigerian minister of Interior, General Abdulrahman Dambazau has formally presented the matter to President Muhammadu Buhari for a diplomatic solution but, for proper clarifications, neither the Interior minister nor the Comptroller General of Nigerian Immigration Service, Babandede was forthcoming when our editors tried to contact them through their cell phones. They neither answered the call nor responded to text messages sent to them. [myad]
