Four Nigerian men in an attempt to flee their home country spent 14 days at the sea perched on a cargo ship’s rudder. The men ran out of food and drink on the 10th day at sea. They survived the next 4 days by drinking the sea water below them. They were rescued by the Brazilian federal police in the southeastern port of Vitoria.
They journeyed across some 5,600 kilometres of ocean. One of the four men, 38-year-old Thankgod Opemipo Matthew Yeye, in an interview said, “It was a terrible experience for me…On board it is not easy. I was shaking, so scared. But I’m here.”
Hoped Europe, landed in Brazil
The men had hoped to reach Europe but to their shock they landed in Brazil. Since reaching the South American nation, two men have returned to Nigeria upon their request, while Yeye and 35-year-old Roman Ebimene Friday have applied for asylum in Brazil.
Yeye and Friday said that they escaped Nigeria because of economic hardships, political instability and crime. Yeye, who is a pentecostal minister from Lagos state, lost his peanut and palm oil farm to floods this year. This left him and his family homeless. He hopes his family can join him in Brazil.
Friday’s journey to Brazil started on June 27. When he got to the rudder with the help of a fisherman, he saw the other three men, who he had never met before, were there already. He feared they could toss him in the water any moment.
The four made every attempt to not be discovered by the ship’s crew who they feared might throw them in the water. “Maybe if they catch you they will throw you in the water,” Friday said. “So we taught ourselves never to make a noise.”
To prevent themselves from falling into the water, Friday said the men rigged up a net around the rudder and tied themselves to it with a rope. When he looked down, he said he could see “big fish like whales and sharks.” Due to the cramped conditions and the noise of the engine, sleep was rare and risky. “I was very happy when we got rescued,” he said.
(With Reuters inputs)