Drug related murders have come to haunt us again. In a gory throwback to the murder of a Nigerian in end October 2013, a Nigerian national was killed, stabbed twice by another Nigerian, at Girkarwada, Arambol on Saturday evening.
(Our report on Page 1 of this edition of the incident states “According to sources at Pernem Police Station, four Nigerians were at Girkarwada near a banyan tree on the path leading to the beach, when two of them clashed at about 5.30 pm. Sources said that one of the Nigerians stabbed the other twice in the back. Police said that deceased has been identified as Prince Ekene (aged around 26 to 28) from Nigeria”).
Nothing really has changed except the date and time. The activity of Nigerians , the manner in which they continue to live here, many without documents and their very obvious involvement in the drug business, should embarrass Goa. It is unbecoming of a State to allow their presence and dominance in manner which is so brazen and illegal.
On October 31, 2013, the day after the murder of Obodo Uzoma Simeon, a Nigerian national, in the village of Parra, an angry mob of Nigerians stopped a hearse carrying the body of their country man and placed it on NH 17. They then blocked the highway screaming revenge against the Goan drug gang allegedly responsible for the murder and ran riot.
The incident attracted global attention with The New York Times reporting, “Goa’s chief minister, Manohar Parrikar, said Mr. Simeon was a casualty of a war between two drug gangs and announced plans for a crackdown on the Nigerian nationals who are living in the state illegally. In response, the consular attaché of Nigeria in Delhi warned that Indians living in Nigeria would be “thrown out on the streets if Nigerians were asked to leave their rented accommodations in Goa”.
The State crackdown on drugs may have just begun but there has been no orchestrated crackdown on Nigerians (or Africans ) from that continent whose presence in the villages on Parra, Arpora and even parts of Morjim has not waned.
In 2015, over 500 Nigerians lived in Goa, but only 19 were registered with the Foreigner Regional Registration Office. Out of the 52 Nigerians arrested in connection with the killing in Porvorim, only 14 submitted identification in the form of residential permits, original or copies of passports.
Goa cannot allow the dominance and presence of these people, not because they are from a certain country in Africa but because of the nature of their activities and their clear unambiguous involvement in the drug business of many. Those involved in crime need to be housed in a detention centre and deported even if they try and hoodwink the system by losing their passports to conceal identity. Their finger prints should be used to identity their records and to do that there needs to be some sharing of data bases or at least close cooperation between the Nigerian authorities in New Delhi and the Goa government.
This is an absolute priority and one of the first major steps towards making North Goa drug free.
