By Wisdom Deji-Folutile
African students stranded in Sumy State University Ukraine have cried out for help amid the Russian invasion of the East European country.
It was gathered that nearly 900 African, Asian and middle-eastern foreign students seeking to leave the country have been stranded in the north-eastern state since the invasion began on February 24. About 400 of those students are Nigerians.
Michael, a Ghanaian student also stranded in Ukraine, said they had been stuck in the city since the invasion began.
“Since the invasion of Ukraine, we (have been) in Sumy and we are stuck in the city. We don’t know when help is going to come. We don’t know how we are going to get out of the city,” he said.
University officials urged the students to shelter in place until safe passage can be arranged.
“There are Russian soldiers surrounding the whole city and the school felt like it’s better that we stay.
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“It’s really crazy out here. Bombardments at night. We ran to the shelters. The school brings us food, but we don’t know how long it is going to last,” Michael said.
Mary Matthews, a Nigerian student, said that majority of the stranded students are foreign scholars from Africa and India.
“Majority are African and Indian foreign students here. And then we have students from the Middle-Eastern countries as well,” she said.
The students have been unable to leave because their commuting routes are already occupied by Russian and Ukrainian troops engaged in a fierce battle.
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According to Matthews, after the bombing, the train lines were destroyed.
“After the bombing happened, we got information that our trains weren’t working because our train line got destroyed. So we don’t have that as an option to go out. The roads as well were occupied by Russian soldiers as well as Ukrainian soldiers. There was a lot of fighting going on,” she said.
Some students have considered escaping the northeastern city by travelling westward, but school authorities are unwilling to let them embark on the nearly day-long expedition.
“From our city to the west is about 16-18 hours. And they are not willing to allow us to leave. When I wake up, I’m just thinking of ‘how am I going to get out of here?'” Michael said.
Videos from social media showed the students walking and protesting.
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“We did not ask them to stop their war. We just want to go home. I don’t even want to come back. Let us just go home. They should allow us to go home,” one of the students could be heard saying.
Another student mentioned that some other students of other schools were provided with buses to leave but Sumy state University had failed to do the same.
— FG calls for patience —
The Public Relations Officer of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM), Gabriel Odu, said that the Federal Government is utilising the temporary ceasefire agreement between Russia and Ukraine to quickly evacuate the stranded students.
“We are aware of the situation. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the National Emergency Management Agency are also aware because we are all working together,” he said.
“Right now, we are capitalising on the ceasefire agreement between Russia and Ukraine to speed up the evacuation of the students tapped in Sumy. We have done about three evacuations now, and it’s only Sumy that is giving us an issue because it is in the North-Eastern part of Ukraine.”
The PRO pleaded for patience to get the students out safely, adding that the federal government is in talks with international partners to carry out the evacuation.
“Nigerians should give us some more time to evacuate the students in Sumy. We are working with other governments and the International Red Cross to bring the students out,” he said.
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