Posted by By Ayodele Ale on
He lives in a shack beside the American embassy at Walter Carrinton Crescent, Victoria Island, Lagos. Each morning, he wakes up and heads straight to the citizen's stand at the embassy in his only dress - an American jail suit.
He lives in a shack beside the American embassy at Walter Carrinton Crescent, Victoria Island, Lagos. Each morning, he wakes up and heads straight to the citizen's stand at the embassy in his only dress - an American jail suit.
Obviously in his 40s, Grayson Ernest Eugene lies and wakes up with the belief that he has no other life outside the United States of America where he said he was born and lived until December 13, 2006 when American immigration officials flew him to Nigeria in handcuffs and dumped him at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport.
Of course, his constant appearance in a jail suit is a source of serious embarrassment to the officials of the embassy. Daily security officials at the embassy makes effort to drive him away, to no avail.
But Eugene says his continuous appearance at the embassy in a jail uniform is deliberate. He said it was his own way of compelling the embassy to do something about his desire to return to his country.
'My appearance there is causing discomfort for the embassy officials, because they are violating my right as an American citizen as enshrined in the American constitution. No one does it," he said in an affected American accent.
Many US citizens and intending travellers who see him at the embassy often take to their heels upon sighting him.
But Eugene says he is fighting the battle of his life. 'It is like they have brought me here to kill me, because I have no business being here in the first place," he said, insisting he was not a Nigerian in spite of US officials' claims to the contrary.
"I was brought here without anything. I mean there is nothing to identify me. There was no deportation order, and I was not received by the Nigerian government. So, no one knows that I am here, not even my people in America. I don't have the telephone number of Kemi, the mother of my only child. The last time I had contact with her was April 2000 when she visited me in my correctional institution," he said.
Eugene gave his mother's name as Sylvie Atkins and his father's as Grayson. 'I never knew him. The American society is a different world. I think he just had a brief contact with my mum and she became pregnant. Then she decided to name me after him," he said.
His journey into trouble began on March 31, 1999 when he was arrested by security agents at his Brooklyn home New York city in connection with a credit card fraud.
Found guilty of conspiracy and stealing, he was sentenced to 51 months imprisonment to be followed by a three-year supervised release.
At the completion of the jail term, however, he was deported during his transfer from the Federal Bureau of Prison to MDC Brooklyn, New York, for a release programme at the prison bureau.
He said, "Usually, when people are about to be released, they will be unfettered. But in my case, I remained in handcuffs," he said.
And rather than taking him to where he would be released, he was ferried to the airport in his jail suit and deported to Nigeria.
'I was forced into the plane with handcuffs. I first thought it was a joke," he recollected.
But he realised how wrong he was when they dumped him at the Murtala Mohammed Airport and left.
'The journey lasted about 18 hours and while the other passengers were alighting from the plane, I remained seated, thinking that I would be going back with the plane," Eugene recalled. To his amazement, he was pushed onto the tarmac in his jail suit and handcuffs, while the immigration officials that escorted him only threw the keys to the handcuffs at him.
"Some sympathisers calmed me down and asked me what was the problem. I explained to them, and told them that I did not know anybody in Nigeria because I had lived all my life in America. 'I had no dime on me. Five of them contributed money and called a taxi to take me to the American Embassy on Victoria Island," he said.
But his call at the embassy did not help the situation. 'Someone came to interrogate me and I explained myself. I was actually expecting them to take my DNA and fingerprints to verify my claim, but they did not do any of those." Thus began his travails in Nigeria. 'At times, I stayed for a week without food and I would feel I should just die," he said.
Eugene had spent several months in Ikoyi Prison at the prompting of embassy officials who also dragged him to court and insisted he was not an American citizen but was only born in America to a Nigerian father who named him Ayodeji. All that America had done, they said, was to return him to his fatherland.
In his judgment dated November 21, 2007, presiding senior magistrate, Mr Rasaq Davies, noted that Eugene had been uprooted from 'the only place, background and root he knew." He was discharged and acquitted, while it was ordered that he be released to one Reverend Fatuaa, Head, Prisoner's Welfare Restoration International Outreach, to take care of him so that he would not constitute a nuisance to the Nigerian society.
Eugene, who claimed he was a driver in the US, insisted that Ayodeji was a name imposed on him by prison officials in America. 'I don't know what the hell they are talking about. I was tried as Ernest Grayson, I am not Ayodeji.
'What the embassy did not want to do is what I have asked them to do, that is to take my DNA and fingerprints and send them to the US. Let them conduct a test. If they find that I am lying, then, I will accept my fate."
Eugene vowed to continue to go to the embassy until they accede to his request. 'The citizens' stand at the American consulate is my duty post because I have no other place to go," he said.
Eugene said he had, since his deportation to Nigeria been living on charity, particularly from some of the people he met during his detention at Ikoyi Prison. He also vowed to continue wearing his only jail suit until his request to be taken back to America was met.
The Information officer with American consulate in Nigeria, Mr Omowunmi Femi said at the Broad Street Office of United States Information Service (USIS) that he was not competent to speak on the plight of Grayson. 'At present, the person who can give you any information on him is my boss who is out of the country."
As you are aware, there are some changes in the information unit things are yet to be regularised," he said.
Also, Mrs Omotunde, another infirmation officer with the embassy said, 'Our own concern is limited to what is happeneing in Nigeria here. We cannot comment on what is happening about any individual right in the US."