No Nigerian lives have been lost in the turmoil engulfing Sudan, according to Zubairu Dada, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, who said this on Wednesday.
At a post-Federal Executive Council meeting press conference, he made this statement and added that the Federal Government has already finalised arrangements to evacuate more than 5,000 residents from the war-torn nation.
Read Also: Sudan: FG Reveals Plans Are Underway To Deploy Air Transport To Evacuate Nigerian Citizens
According to him, the first group of Nigerians is being transported as of this Wednesday. He also mentioned that the citizens will be transported by buses through Egypt before being flown.
Dada said;
The evacuation is being done in batches to ensure the safety of all Nigerians. But the good news is that no Nigerian life has been lost so far.
I think it’s important to stress that all Nigerians are very safe. And we’re very confident and hopeful that we shall not lose any Nigerian life Insha Allah in this exercise. All is well and we’re good to go.
The Minister added that the government has also arranged for security support and transportation for the Nigerians to the Egyptian border.
He said the government was making every effort to evacuate as many Nigerians as possible during the 72-hour window provided by the Sudanese government.
On whether all Nigerians will be evacuated before the 72 hour window, Dada said;
We have no problem about the 72 hour window because we’ve talked to all the authorities concerned and we’re on the same page.
But talking about the window, we are making every effort to ensure that we make use of this window to evaluate as many Nigerians as we possibly can.
The latest conflict is between forces loyal to army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan against those of his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who commands the heavily armed paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
The RSF emerged from the Janjaweed militia that then-president Omar al-Bashir unleashed in the Darfur region two decades ago, leading to war crimes charges against Bashir and others.
