No fewer than 1,100 Nigerian migrants have arrived in Kano from Agadez, Niger Republic, via road, with officials from federal and state agencies coordinating their documentation, counselling, and family reintegration, the Nigeria Immigration Service said on Friday.
The Commandant of the Immigration Training School, Kano, Anthony Akuneme, said returnees are being processed through the Migration Information and Data Analysis System at the Migrants Arrival, Knowledge and Information Area centre before being transferred to the International Transit and Stay of Knowledge centre for final profiling and psychosocial support.
He added that personnel from the Kano Nationality Sortation Centre, MAKIA, and ITSK, alongside other agencies, are on ground to ensure an orderly process.
The reintegration programme is jointly implemented by the NIS, the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, the International Organization for Migration, and state authorities.
The latest arrivals are part of ongoing assisted and voluntary returns from Agadez, a major transit point in northern Niger that has long served as a gateway for West African migrants attempting to reach Europe through Libya and the Mediterranean.
Although Niger enacted anti-smuggling laws after 2015 that significantly reduced migration flows, irregular movements along the corridor have persisted.
The 2023 military coup that removed former President Mohamed Bazoum further weakened migration control systems in the country, and IOM data indicate that movement along the route has picked up again in recent months, with Nigerians accounting for a significant share of returnees.
IOM noted that since 2017, its operations in Niger have supported the voluntary return of thousands of stranded Nigerians — many of them young men who had attempted to migrate to Europe but were unable to continue owing to financial constraints, detention, or disruptions in smuggling networks.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees separately reported in April 2026 that over 269,000 Nigerians displaced by insurgency in the Northeast are currently sheltering in Niger’s Diffa region.
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