200 irregular immigrants arrested in Lagos

The Nigeria Immigration Service, NIS, Lagos State Command, on Friday said that it arrested more than 200 suspected irregular immigrants in a week.
The Comptroller of Immigration in charge of the command, Julius Ogbu, gave the figure while briefing journalists in Lagos.
He described as unfounded, the rumour that the arrest focused on northern Nigerians resident in the state.
The NIS and other security agencies including the police had, in separate operations last week, made some arrests in a bid to prevent terrorists from attacking the state.
Mr. Ogbu said that the suspects would be screened at the NIS detention centre to ascertain their nationalities, check their travel documents and purposes of visit, before deciding their fate.
The immigration chief said that the arrest was done randomly without knowing the actual identity of those involved.
According to him, about 110 suspected irregular immigrants had earlier been deported to their various countries mostly within the West Coast.
He said that the NIS notified embassies before embarking on the operation to enable them inform their nationals who had not regularised to go back to their countries to do so.
Mr. Ogbu did not say any of the suspects was arrested with a weapon.
(NAN)