Deported Nigerian student claims he was assaulted by gangsters

A STUDENT deported to Nigeria earlier this week claims he was assaulted by gangsters after being forced to bail himself out of prison there following his arrival from Ireland.

Elukanlo Olakunle, who was a student at Palmerstown Community College in Dublin, was one of 25 adults and children deported on Monday.

In an email to TD Joe Higgins, 19-year-old Olakunle also claimed he was not allowed to speak to his lawyer before being deported. He described how he was put on board the chartered flight with no possessions and wearing his school uniform his only clothes.

"I arrived in Nigeria on Tuesday morning and was handed over to Nigeria immigration who took me to Alagbon Prison," he wrote.

"I was lucky to bail myself out through the assistance of one of the inmates who sympathised with me. I left the prison and had nowhere to go.

"I ran into some gangsters who thought I had money on me. I was attacked and molested." Mr Olakunle said he was injured and his clothes were torn. He flagged down a car.

"The man stopped and I explained my situation to him. He took me to his house. There is no electricity, my clothes are torn, I'm starving and (have) no medication for injuries I have sustained."

He appealed for help to return to Dublin to finish his studies.

Fellow pupils at Palmerstown protested outside the Dáil on Tuesday against his deportation.

The Nigerian, who arrived in Ireland as an unaccompanied minor three years ago, says he has no family in his native country and that his father was shot dead in front of him.