On August 23rd 2011, Nigerians in Thailand protested against maltreatment, misrepresentation and corruption by its embassy in Thailand. The counselor and the ambassador instead of seeking to know and address the reasons for the protest turned around to arrest, torture and imprison some Nigerians who took part in that peaceful protest.
On August 23rd 2011, Nigerians in Thailand protested against maltreatment, misrepresentation and corruption by its embassy in Thailand. The counselor and the ambassador instead of seeking to know and address the reasons for the protest turned around to arrest, torture and imprison some Nigerians who took part in that peaceful protest.
Some people who participated in that protest are now languishing in Thai jails nearly doubling the number of Nigerian inmates in Thai prison custodies….all because the Nigerian ambassador Mr. Suleiman with his drunkard and womanizing counselor Mr. Abayomi O. Bamgbelu instructed the Thai police to deal mercilessly with these peaceful protesters especially those from Igbo (eastern Nigeria) and the Niger Delta.
Those participants from Hausa and Yoruba tribes are left alone to freely go about their businesses while the Igbos and the Niger Deltas are being hunted, arrested, tortured, and are likely to face imprisonment as the ambassador and the counselor have vowed to use their diplomatic influence to either send them to jail or ensure their deportation back to Nigeria.
The few who have not been arrested are now on the run and in hiding leaving their works and businesses behind regardless of their financial obligations to themselves and their families back home in Nigeria who depend on them for financial upkeeps.
I don’t know if the reason for this singled-out arrest of the Igbos and Niger Deltas is because the ambassador and counselor are from Hausa and Yoruba tribes respectively. Is this marginalization across the border? Well, I believe the civil war and the days of abandoned properties are truly over even though what the Igbos and Niger Deltans are now facing in Thailand does not suggest so.
Below are some of the major reasons for that protest:
a. That the newly elected president, Mr. Gilbert Akudo Ndigwe a.k.a Kudos of the Nigerians Community Association of Thailand say that it is wrong and no longer acceptable for the embassy to be charging Nigerians 25,000 Thai baht (US$830) to issue traveling certificates for any Nigerian whose passport is lost or who has no passport but wants to go home.
The embassy is afraid of this man and has refused to endorse his election which was perfectly free and fair because they see him as strong anti-corruption crusader. During his campaign, he promised to help stop corruption and misrepresentation by the embassy. Because of that the embassy tried to stop the election from holding but it was too late for them. The election was held and Mr. Kudos won. The embassy changed strategy by refusing to endorse his presidency as has been the case in previous years.
b. That the newly elected leadership of the Nigerians Community Association of Thailand say it is wrong for the embassy to be charging Nigerians 2,300 Thai baht {US$80} to issue any kind of one page simple letter of identification or certification for any Nigerian in Thailand for any purpose.
c. The Nigerians in Thailand say that it is wrong for the embassy to show a nonchalant attitude (which has become its usual action) whenever any Nigerian die in Thailand and the embassy is called upon to identify or certify the deceased as a true Nigerian because some other Africans are believed to be also using Nigerian passports here.
This has made Thai apartment managements and hospitals to burn the bodies of up to seven Nigerians since last year who died in Thailand and burning dead loved ones is against the religious, cultural and traditional belief of Nigeria. Whenever a Nigerian has any kind of problem (immigration, racism, or any kind of problem with Thai authorities) the embassy never care to send somebody for the troubled Nigerian.
This is unlike other embassies here in Thailand. An American, British, French, German, or any western man can never be intimidated or harassed in Thailand without their embassy coming for him or her. This can never be said of our Nigerian embassy in Thailand because we have a careless and selfish ambassador and counselor. Nigeria is the giant of Africa so can’t we look for avenues such as the humiliating prejudices we suffer abroad {mostly in Thailand} to show the world that we are truly the giant of Africa and even beyond the borders of Africa and thus cannot be treated like dwarfs irrespective of where we are on the face of the earth?
d. Nigerians in Thailand are now strongly voicing out that it is wrong for the embassy to refuse to recognize the free and fair election of the newly elected president Mr. Gilbert Akudo Ndigwe {a.k.a Kudos} of the Nigerian Community Association of Thailand. This is because the new president who the embassy refused to indorse was massively elected by majority of Nigerians in Thailand on his unique integrity and campaign promise to expose and help stop massive corruption in Nigeria embassy against Nigerians and to stamp out frequent jailing of Nigerians as a result of the evil activities of few Nigerians against others.
e. That Nigerians in Thailand are condemning and saying that it is an art of diplomatic corruption for the embassy in last year’s October 1st Golden Jubilee celebration to have given the Nigerian Community Association of Thailand only US$2000 to organize the celebration when it was learnt that the Federal government sent tens of thousands of dollars for the celebration. Is that not imported corruption? EFCC should be made aware of this and probe into it. President Goodluck Jonathan cannot be fighting corruption at home, and Ambassador Suleiman will be importing it from home into our honorable embassy here in Thailand. This is totally unacceptable by concerned Nigerians in Thailand of which I am one of.
f. That Nigerians in Thailand under its new community leadership say it is wrong for the embassy to have embezzled or withheld money that Nigerians in Thailand massively, charitably, and freely contributed or donated for over a year now and gave to the embassy to give to Nigerians in Thai prison custodies for their welfare. I know distance is not a barrier for EFCC probe.
g. Nigerians in Thailand are now voicing out strong disappointment by the embassy and saying that it is wrong for the embassy to keep quiet (feel unconcerned) and not speak on our behalf to the Thai immigration authorities about how they have made it very tough for Nigerians to extend their Thai visas or get new ones while other passports including other African passports find it very easy and comfortable to get and extend their Thai visas.
Sometimes the Thai Immigration officials will raid Nigerians and accuse them falsely that their Thai visas are no longer genuine, when it was actually authorized from them, and one may have stressfully extended the visa more than once in their immigration office…yet they accuse and arrest you at will, and our embassy does nothing about it not-minding how long you will stay in their immigration jail or normal prison. Countless number of Nigerians currently in Thailand are feeling this pain …their families back home believing and thinking their children are working in Thailand.
h. That Nigerians in Thailand under Mr. Kudos new rule are now boldly condemning what they call “diplomatic protection and support for evil” and are saying it is very wrong for the ambassador and the counselor to be supporting or blocking a disciplinary action supposed to have been given by Nigeria Community Association Thailand to those few Nigerians who do evil sabotage against their fellow Nigerians by setting them up thereby landing them often into Thai jails.
This is because this evil group led by their ring leader Mr. Jerry Chike Obinabo and his errand boys who include: Mr. Opio, Mr. Dike Mr. Aguleri, Mr. Nsiko, etc, who are big drug dealers in Thailand are regularly donating huge cash gifts to ambassador and the Counselor. There was a rumor that they gave ambassador via the counselor an amount of US$45,000 in this last Muslim Sala festival.
Their main reason of these regular cash donation is for the embassy to protect them since they are sensing that the new Nigeria Community Association of Thailand is against their evil activities and is planning appropriate disciplinary punishment for them over their evil actions against their own brothers. These men are really evil and any Nigerian in Thailand can attest to that.
It is unfortunate that the ambassador and the counselor have sold their conscious for drug money to support and protect this evil group due to their own selfish financial benefits from these people. This is against the spirit of patriotism which Nigeria direly needs now that the Transformation Agenda of President Goodluck Jonathan is picking strong momentum.
The immediate past embassy counselor Mr. Henry Offor fought this evil group but this new ambassador and counselor allowed themselves to be bought over by these evil men who earn their living by putting other Nigerians to jail. You can contact Mr. Henry Offor who was the immediate former counselor to inquire about these evil men and evil activities in Thailand.
Some Nigerians who participated in that protest are languishing in Thailand jails since one week now and the embassy is working very hard preventing all efforts to grant them bail. The ambassador has also instructed the Thai police to arrest, detain, torture, and imprison all who partook in that protest. For the past one week, many Nigerians are in hiding, leaving their businesses, for fear of this embassy-instigated arrest.
The most painful part of this all is that it was the majority of all the Nigerians in Thailand that protested against these bad things the embassy is doing on that fateful day 23 August 2011, But the ambassador Mr. Suleiman who called the Igbos touts and the counselor Mr. Abayomi O. Bamgbelu in the embassy who once said the Igbos are illiterates and bunch of nuisance in Thailand.
This ambassador and the counselor turned around to single out only the Igbos and the Niger Deltas who participated in that peaceful protest …using Thai police to arrest them, detain them, torture and imprison them.
One Niger Delta guy who challenged the counselor and told him to his face in a beer/massage parlor in the Onnut Soi 17 area of Bangkok where he normally goes to drink and sugar-daddy that he was doing bad to the image of Nigeria by instigating foreign police to be arresting Nigerians; the guy said “I am a Niger Deltan I will tell it to you, I don’t fear anybody”.
The counselor so undiplomatically responded by telling the guy that he won’t blame him for boldly saying he was a Niger Delta and that if not for OBJ’s historic sympathetic mistake of bring one of them out of the underwater to national lime light where will he {the guy} be by now to stupidly be boasting to him of being from the Niger Delta? I don’t know if he was referring to President Goodluck Jonathan when he said of OBJ’s historic mistake. All I know is that president Goodluck Jonathan is and will never be anybody’s mistake on Nigeria. If this counselor thinks that way, then he needs to explain to Nigerians what he really mean and who he was referring to as OBJ’s historic mistake from the Niger Delta to national lime light.
In this whole wide world, this is my first time of seeing or reading of an ambassador arresting, detaining, torturing and jailing his own country’s citizens he was sent to protect in a foreign land. Is this good? Does it suppose? This ambassador is threatening to use his diplomatic influence to deal with these peaceful protesters mostly those from Igbo and Niger Delta sides. That is why he has influenced the Thai police to deal with the protesters. This is diplomatic wickedness!
We need a new patriotic ambassador here in Thailand because this ambassador Mr. Suleiman and his counselor Mr. Abayomi do not care about Nigerians in Thailand due to majority of Nigerians here are Igbos and Niger deltas. By using Thai police to arrest, detain, torture, and imprison Nigerians here, this man has lost all legitimacy to remain Nigeria Ambassador to Thailand.
No matter how angered or emotional irritated he became as a result of the protest, how can such a chief diplomat be so undiplomatic to his own people? That’s why I titled this report The Undiplomatic Diplomat. We are like his children and he like our father… yet resolving what supposed to be a family dispute has exposed his management incompetence. A father who cannot keep his own household needs to be demoted to a son and a son who can boldly take fatherly responsibilities should be promoted to replace the fatherless father.
Please let the world read this and help Nigerians in Thailand.
Thanks for taking a part of your precious time to read this report, and hope you can do something to help Nigerians in Thailand, mostly the officials of the Nigeria Community Association of Thailand, from the brutalities of this unpatriotic ambassador Mr. Suleiman (cellphone - +66-818751901) in collaboration with his drunkard and womanizing counselor Mr. Abayomi O. Bamgbelu (cellphone- +66-804446330)
Please note the official contact information of this embassy.
Nigeria Embassy, Thailand
412 Sukhumvit 71 Prakanong
10110 Bangkok, Thailand
Phone:+662-711-3076
+662-711-3078
Fax: +662-392-6398
Email: [email protected]
[email protected]
Website URL: www.embnigeriabkk.com
I am Sincerely Yours A Concerned Nigerian
Mr. Igbokwe Udoachia
([email protected])
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