The Federal Government of Nigeria will today commence the evacuation of Nigerians stranded abroad. This will commence with the evacuation of 265 of its citizens in the United Arab Emirates .

This was disclosed in a statement by Mr. Ferdinand Nwonye, Spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The statement read: ”The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is in the process of evacuating Nigerians from abroad and in accordance with Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) guidelines, the evacuees will undergo a mandatory 14-day supervised quarantine in a monitored environment.

“In this regard, Emirate Airlines is scheduled to evacuate the first batch of 265 Nigerians from Dubai, UAE and they will arrive at 3pm on Wednesday, 6th May 2020 at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos.

“Arrangement for hotel accommodation in Lagos and Abuja have been made for their evacuation process. The hotels have been inspected by the following: Port Health Service, Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority, Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) and Ministry of Foreign Affairs and IPC.”

“The hotels include: Bolingo Hotel-300 rooms, Apo Apartments -61 rooms, Royalty-80 rooms, Chida International- 200 rooms, Belvior -30 rooms and Barcelona- 300 rooms.”

“Discussions are also ongoing with the British Airways (BA), through the British High Commission, to evacuate about 300 Nigerians from London on Friday, 8th May, 2020. The flight (BA 9155) will depart London Heathrow Airport terminal 5 at 7.10 am and arrive Lagos at 1.10 pm .

Additional agreements are ongoing with Ethiopian Airlines to bring evacuees back to Abuja from New York on Monday, 11th May, 2020.”

There are over 4,000 Nigerians stranded across the world due to the coronavirus lockdown.