‘I’ll never go back’: Nigerians flee South Africa xenophobic violence

Five years ago, the young technician left Imo in southern Nigeria to start a new life in South Africa’s economic capital Johannesburg.

Twelve people were killed and hundreds of shops destroyed in and around Johannesburg last week in a spate of attacks against foreigners fuelled by soaring unemployment and poverty.

It’s not the first time Victor has had to deal with “this kind of thing”, he told AFP on the tarmac of Lagos airport.

“There’s been three times where there was this kind of thing, these xenophobic attacks. But this recent one now is just too much”.

“It was by my shop. I ran out and saw them lying on the floor. I went to check on them and saw they were my friends. I had to cry, as a human being,” he said, gulping down a lump in his throat.

Telling the difference between xenophobic attacks, gang violence and widespread crime is difficult in South Africa.With 58 murders every day, the 57-million strong country has one of the world’s highest homicide rates.

“South Africa is a place where people can shoot you, rob you and police won’t do anything,” Victor said.

Kayode, who didn’t want to give his last name, moved to South Africa’s administrative capital Pretoria seven years ago for “adventure”.

“I travelled just because I wanted to live life, see the world”, he said. “I was happy”.

But last week, after local taxi drivers warned that “that there’s going to be xenophobia attacks”, he rushed to the Nigerian embassy, filled out an evacuation form and headed for Johannesburg airport. He waited there for almost a week before flying out on Wednesday.Back in Lagos, Nigeria’s government has promised to help those returning from South Africa.

Speaking to reporters on the tarmac, Nigerian foreign affairs representative Abike Dabiri-Erewa said the government would pay for citizen’s travel expenses to reach their families and enrol them in programmes to find work or start a business.

For Nicholas Olalekan, who ran a hair salon in Pretoria, his future is “in God’s hands”.

“My customer who I was cutting, they stabbed him, he died. They stabbed me in my nose, look. I could have died”.

“I just escaped”.