President Bola Tinubu has sent a high-powered team to the United Kingdom in a bid to oversee the potential transfer of former Senate Deputy President Ike Ekweremadu back to Nigeria to serve the remainder of his sentence. The delegation, which includes Foreign Affairs Minister Yusuf Tuggar and Attorney General and Minister of Justice Lateef Fagbemi, arrived in London on Monday.
Their objective: engage with officials at the UK Ministry of Justice on whether Ekweremadu can be transferred to Nigeria under the terms of his conviction abroad. Ekweremadu was convicted in March 2023 by a UK court for his role in an organ-trafficking scheme, in what was the first case of its kind under the UK Modern Slavery Act. He received a prison sentence of nine years and eight months; his wife and a doctor linked to the case were also sentenced.
The case dates back to June 2022, when the London Metropolitan Police detained the Ekweremadus after allegations emerged that a 21-year-old man had been deceived into coming to the UK for an £80,000 kidney transplant, which turned out to be part of the illicit scheme. With the delegation now in London, Nigeria is exploring the legal and diplomatic pathways for Ekweremadu’s transfer — a move that could signal a shift in how transnational convictions and prisoner-transfer agreements are managed in the bilateral relationship between Nigeria and the UK.
