Adams Oshiomhole, chairman of the Senate Committee on Interior has claimed that many construction workers in Nigeria are actually prisoners from other countries brought into Nigeria to work as expatriates.
He said the situation was taking jobs from Nigerian citizens and warned the Ministry of Interior to show more restraint and discernment in issuance of expatriate quota to foreign companies.
The pointed remark was made while he addressed the Interior Minister Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo and his ministry team as they defended their budget on Wednesday during hearing on the 2024 appropriate bill of President Bola Tinubu, relating to the ministry of interior.
“Your ministry needs to regulate the issuance of the quotas very well as I have it on good authority that prisoners from foreign lands are working in Nigeria as construction workers,” Oshiomhole said.
He said he was hard pressed not to reveal any specific names of companies involved except he was provoked to do so.
“Many non-Nigerians are in the country, some of them live inside containers. They were being paid according to their country’s minimum wage by the construction industry that brought them. I don’t want to mention the companies’ names, but if I’m provoked, I’ll mention them.”
Mr Tunji-Ojo promised his ministry was taking steps to protect Nigerian jobs and that the ministry has a scheme – Expatriate Employee Network – to address such concerns.
Oshiomhole was once a unionist but later veered into politics, elected as governor of Edo State and later appointed party Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress before joining the senate in June 2023.
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