The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the returnees arrived at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, in a chartered Airbus A330-200 flight with Registration number 5A- LAT at 9.15pm.

They had been stranded in the course of their failed attempt to cross over to Europe through the volatile North African country.

The returnees were assisted back to Nigeria by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) while the Italian Government provided the aircraft.

They were handed over to the Zonal Coordinator of NEMA Southwest, Alhaji Suleiman Yakubu, who received them on behalf of Federal Government.

The female among the returnees comprised 241 adults, two children and five infants while the male comprised four adults, four teenage boys and one infant.

Yakubu enjoined the returnees to embrace the change mantra of the federal government.

He urged them to remain positive and focused on contributing their quota to national development, instead of seeking greener pastures where it doesn’t exist.

ALSO READ: 128 Nigerians deported from Libya

Yakubu noted that they would not be treated as second class citizens in their own country, unlike what they face abroad after migrating illegally.

He disclosed that the European Union was providing the reintegration assistance, urging them to make use of the initiative and better their lives.

NAN reports that other agencies present when Yakubu received the returnees were the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) , the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) and the Police.