In a powerful indictment of current U.S. immigration policies, a coalition of Nigerian civil society organizations under the banner Human Rights Monitors (HRM) has raised the alarm over the ongoing arbitrary deportation of immigrants, particularly those of African descent, by the United States government.
At a press conference held Thursday, May 8, 2025, at the Grand Bohabs Hotel in Abuja, the coalition presented a searing narrative of homes raided at dawn, children witnessing the forcible arrest of their parents, and communities left shattered all under what they described as an inhumane crackdown by the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Since January 20, 2025, HRM reports that there has been an escalation in mass deportations many of them without due process targeting immigrants, asylum seekers, and those granted Temporary Protected Status (TPS), including Nigerians, Ghanaians, Kenyans, and others fleeing war, persecution, and economic collapse.
“We have seen families being torn apart,” said Armsfree Ajanaku for the coalition. “We’ve watched children cry as their parents are handcuffed in front of them, and immigrants who fled unimaginable horrors treated like criminals simply for seeking refuge.”
HRM’s concerns have not remained local. In a recent move, the coalition submitted a formal statement to the 58th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, drawing global attention to what they described as gross violations of international law.
Titled “Forced and Arbitrary Deportation of Immigrants in the United States and Its Implications for Human Rights,” the submission urged the United States to uphold its obligations under international human rights law, including the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol.
“What we are witnessing is a rollback of decades of human rights progress,” the statement declared, highlighting how asylum seekers and migrants are being denied access to due process, separated from their families, and subjected to racial profiling in defiance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
For many African families, the consequences of deportation are devastating. One anonymous testimony shared by HRM revealed how a Nigerian man, a former engineering lecturer fleeing political persecution, was arrested in front of his family in Texas and deported within 72 hours without a hearing, despite having pending asylum paperwork.
“He called from Lagos, broken and suicidal,” said a family friend. “His American-born children now ask daily why daddy was taken away like a thief.”
The coalition emphasized that deportation, in many cases, now bypasses judicial oversight. “This is not just a legal issue; it’s a human issue,” said HRM, calling the treatment of African and Caribbean immigrants part of a larger trend of xenophobic nationalism and racialized governance.
HRM pointed out that the United States once seen as a haven for the persecuted is now increasingly violating the very ideals it helped enshrine in global consciousness: the right to seek asylum, the dignity of the human family, and protection from refoulement, the forced return of refugees to danger.
“When the world’s most powerful democracy begins to tear apart the core fabric of human rights protections, the consequences are global,” said Gloria Agema, an activist with Gee Foundation for Social Justice and Development, one of the coalition’s member organizations.
But the coalition also turned the spotlight on African governments. They urged state actors to move beyond lip service and take concrete steps to support their citizens abroad, especially given the significant financial contributions of the African diaspora Nigerians alone remitted over $6 billion from the U.S. in 2020.
Beyond immediate advocacy, HRM is pushing for a broader recalibration of Africa’s international standing, using the platform to commend the African Union for declaring 2025 the Year of Justice for Africans and People of African Descent Through Reparations.
“It is time for Africa to speak with one voice not only in demanding reparations for centuries of slavery and colonization but also in defending the dignity of its people today,” the group declared.
In closing, HRM called on the United Nations, human rights organizations, and global civil society to rise to the moment. “Immigrants’ rights are human rights,” the coalition said. “This is not just about law it’s about lives.”
Members of the coalition are: Grassroots Centre for Rights and Civic Orientation (Convener and Secretariat), 21st Century Empowerment for Youth and Women, a frontline NGO with United Nations ECOSOC consultative status, the Centre for Environmental Sustainability and Development Awareness (CESDA), Socio-Economic Research and Development Centre and the Centre for Peace Advocacy and Sustainable Development (CESPAD).
