\n<\/p>\n
David Nwamini arrived in Lagos for the first time in 2016. He had come from a village in Ebonyi, a state in southeastern Nigeria. He was 15 years old, the eldest of nine siblings and his parents were farmers. When he was a boy, his father became sick and David started working to assist his family, helping to cut trees and clear land. A few years later, he decided to seek his fortune in Lagos.<\/p>\n
In Nigeria\u2019s commercial capital, David spent his days in the open-air Ikotun Market, where thousands of people shop every day for everything from tomatoes and fabric to suitcases and electronics. He sold cellphone accessories out of a wheelbarrow under a wide umbrella, making less than \u00a310 a day. After living with a relative, he moved into a room with two friends, Chukwudi and Friday, who also worked in the market. David had grown up in the same village as Chukwudi. A photo from their early childhood shows the boys together, David in a red sportswear shirt.<\/p>\n
David was short and slight, with an unassuming face and sleepy eyes. He was playful and liked to joke around, Chukwudi recalled, \u201cnot a troublemaker\u201d. Friday was older and carried himself like he was destined for better things. \u201cFriday was living big boy life,\u201d Chukwudi told me. \u201cHe was balling out, flexing; he can go and eat anything he like.\u201d<\/p>\n
One day in 2021, Friday disappeared from the market. He wouldn\u2019t be in touch again until later that year, when he called David and told him the good news: he had got a job in the UK. \u201cWow, God has done for you then?\u201d David said. Friday asked if David was interested in working abroad. Friday sent his friends videos of himself dancing in London, living the good life. He had accomplished the dream: he had escaped the dim economic prospects offered by his home country and got out. (There is a Yoruba slang term for it: \u201cjapa<\/em>\u201d, or as one Lagosian put it to me, \u201cIt\u2019s like running for your life.\u201d) David was interested in doing the same.<\/p>\n <\/span>David Nwamini (right) and Chukwudi as young boys.<\/span> Photograph: Chukwudi<\/p>\n Soon after, David received a call from a man named Obinna Obeta, who had got his number from Friday. Obeta said that he could help David get to the UK, where he would provide him with accommodation and work. But first, he said, David would need to go to Abuja, Nigeria\u2019s capital, to undergo some medical tests. David wasn\u2019t sure what to make of this, until he received the money for his trip to Abuja. \u201cThat is the day that I knew he was serious,\u201d David later told a court in London. He assumed the medical tests were part of the process for getting a visa.<\/p>\n In February 2022, David said goodbye to Chukwudi at a bus station in Lagos and began his journey to Britain. He had never met Obeta in person. When later asked in court why he thought Obeta was helping him, he responded simply, \u201cBecause I think it\u2019s from God.\u201d<\/p>\n Obinna Obeta, the man who contacted David, was a Nigerian radiologist who had moved to London to seek treatment for kidney failure. Nigeria suffers from high rates of kidney disease, but few have health insurance or can afford dialysis and medications. \u201cKidney disease treatment in Nigeria: people are just moving from here to the morgue. It\u2019s traumatising honestly,\u201d Obeta would later say. It was not until 2025 that Nigeria introduced comprehensive standards and guidelines for organ transplants, and only 2,000 or so kidney transplants have taken place there. Many Nigerians who have undergone organ transplants have done so abroad.<\/p>\n Even in countries with advanced healthcare systems, the wait time for a kidney can be long: two to three years, on average, in the UK, and up to five years or more in the US. According to the World Health Organization, organ transplant tourism \u2013 where patients travel abroad to purchase organs \u2013 accounts for at least 5% to 10% of transplants worldwide. Organ trafficking is believed to take place in about 50 countries, and it is one of the most under-reported forms of human trafficking. The UK considers moving people across international borders for the purpose of harvesting their organs a form of slavery, treating human beings as commodities to be bought and sold.<\/p>\n In July 2021, seven months before David left for the UK, Obeta had undergone a successful kidney transplant at the Royal Free hospital in north London. It cost him \u00a370,000. He used the services of a medical tourism company, run by a Nigerian doctor who was then an NHS consultant. The kidney donor was David\u2019s friend Friday, whom Obeta had falsely claimed was his cousin. In his notes, Obeta\u2019s surgeon described Friday as a \u201cshy, good-looking, muscular man, with large dark eyes, sculptured features, and a bashful manner. He is dressed in a modern, casual style, with his headphones on, and moved with an easy grace.\u201d<\/p>\n On the flight to London, David knew none of this. Accompanied by a man and woman he had not met before, he had only a few possessions: some clothes, lotion and soap. No shoes besides the ones on his feet. It was his first time on a plane, and he slept for much of the flight. After landing, the man took David to a house off the Old Kent Road in south London, where he met Obeta for the first time. David was told he would sleep in the living room.<\/p>\n As David would later testify, Obeta treated him like a \u201chouseboy\u201d. \u201cEvery day I wash plates, I wash toilet, I wash, I sweep,\u201d he recalled. David did not have any money and was reliant on Obeta for his meals. Even his passport was taken. There seemed to be no escape.<\/p>\n Across London, in Willesden Green, Sonia Ekweremadu was getting sicker. Less than two months before David arrived in the UK, she had posted an end-of-year recap reel on her Instagram page. It showed Sonia, a light-skinned 24-year-old woman, dancing, going out with friends, and lying in a hospital bed with a pink teddy bear. Her family home was in Abuja but she lived in London, having attended various private schools in England. With several family properties in Nigeria, as well as in the US and UAE, she had the privileged upbringing that is typical of a Nigerian politician\u2019s children.<\/p>\n Sonia\u2019s father was Ike Ekweremadu, one of the most prominent and powerful figures in Nigeria. Ike Ekweremadu had been elected to the Nigerian senate for a fifth consecutive term in 2019, and served as deputy president of the senate. His reputation extended beyond national borders, after his stint as speaker of the parliament of the Economic Community of West African States in the 2010s.<\/p>\n It was while Sonia was studying for her master\u2019s degree in film at Newcastle University, in 2019, that she became sick. As she grew weaker, she had to drop out. A family friend eventually referred her to the Royal Free in Hampstead, which specialises in treating kidney disease. Sonia was diagnosed with FSGS Nephrotic Syndrome, a rare disease where kidney scarring leaks protein into the urine and causes bodily swelling. In August 2021, Sonia met with Peter Dupont, a consultant nephrologist at the Royal Free, who noted that she would require dialysis or a renal transplant. She received dialysis in a private patients\u2019 unit on the top floor.<\/p>\n In September 2021, the court later heard, Sonia\u2019s uncle, Isaac \u201cDiwe\u201d Ekweremadu, who is a doctor, called an old medical school classmate to talk about the transplant that he had at the Royal Free earlier that year. Diwe wanted to know whether his niece might be able to have a similar operation. His former classmate was Obinna Obeta.<\/p>\n At the time, Obeta was in desperate need of money. As a non-UK resident, he still owed \u00a327,000 to the Royal Free as part of the \u00a370,000 he was paying for his kidney transplant. He also had to spend \u00a31,600 every month on immunosuppressants, so his body wouldn\u2019t reject the kidney, and other medications and tests. \u201cIt just kept increasing. Just kept increasing,\u201d he later said of his debt. For an initial sum of just under \u00a32,000, Obeta agreed to help find a kidney donor for Sonia. He referred the Ekweremadus to the medical concierge service he had used for his own transplant. Soon after, Obeta got in touch with the young man who had provided him with his kidney, Friday, to ask for help finding a donor. Through him, he found David.<\/p>\n By November 2021, Ike Ekweremadu had a solution for his daughter. He forwarded a message to his wife: Diwe had found a donor who \u201cmatched very well\u201d. The next step was to get the donor a passport and then a visa to the UK. David had no idea that the following statement was written on his visa application:<\/p>\n \u201cI wish to state on conclusion of this application that I would be donating an organ to my closest cousin (Sonia Chinonso Ekweremadu) in appreciation for her sacrifices towards me, my family, and our community. I\u2019m willing to put my life on the line for her to live and continue her good service to humanity. Finally, I wish to state that I\u2019ll be travelling in company with my uncle, Obinna. He has been a father\u2011figure since I lost my biological father.\u201d<\/p>\n None of this was true: Sonia was not a relative of David\u2019s, nor was Obinna Obeta. He had never met them. His biological father was still alive. He had never discussed the prospect of organ donation with anyone.<\/p>\n <\/span>Ikotun Market in Lagos where David and Chukwudi worked, 9 July 2021.<\/span> Photograph: NurPhoto SRL\/Alamy<\/p>\n David arrived in London in February 2022. Before his arrival, Sonia\u2019s doctor at the Royal Free had written a letter to the Nigerian doctor who ran the concierge service, stating that she was not responding well to treatments and agreeing that a transplant would be the \u201cbest way forward for her\u201d. The family had informed the Royal Free that they had a candidate, telling them that David was 19 and a distant cousin of Sonia\u2019s. The doctor added in his letter that this prospective donor was younger than he would consider ideal and, because he was not a close relative, there could be difficulties gaining approval from the hospital and the UK Human Tissue Authority.<\/p>\n In the UK, kidney transplants are highly regulated. If the donor is alive, they have to go through extensive physical and psychological evaluations to make sure they are medically suitable and willing to donate. Once the surgical team approves the donation, the Human Tissue Authority must interview both the donor and the recipient to determine whether the donor has given consent and to ensure that no payment or coercion is involved.<\/p>\n According to the court transcript, Sonia\u2019s uncle, Diwe, told her parents that they should now say that David was a first cousin of Sonia, not a distant one. He also later told them that there was a medical secretary at the hospital who would act as David\u2019s interpreter. For a fee of \u00a31,500, she had agreed to coach David on what to say during the interview he\u2019d need to do for his kidney donation to be approved. She recommended that David be at the hospital during Sonia\u2019s dialysis treatments to show his firm commitment to his cousin\u2019s health.<\/p>\n The week of David\u2019s arrival in London, Obeta took him to a west African restaurant on the Old Kent Road to have lunch with a young woman and an older woman. David had no idea who they were, and testified that the women didn\u2019t ask him any questions about himself. They seemed afraid of something, he said. At the end of the lunch, the group took a photo. The two women were Sonia and her mother, Beatrice Ekweremadu.<\/p>\n Later that week, Obeta took David to the Royal Free, where he saw Sonia and Beatrice outside. Before Obeta began talking with them, he told David to stand away so he could not hear. \u201cObinna would just tell me where to stay and he would go with them and they would start discussing. Like they was controlling me,\u201d David testified. He was confused to learn that he would be meeting with a doctor. \u201cThey said if the doctor ask me the school that I go, I should tell the doctor that I go to higher institution,\u201d David told the court. \u201cIf the doctor ask me who is Sonia, I should say that Sonia is my cousin. They give me many things to answer the doctor. I should tell the doctor that they not pay me.\u201d<\/p>\n On 24 February 2022, David went in for a meeting with Peter Dupont, the consultant nephrologist at the Royal Free, while Obeta waited outside. (The Royal Free, on behalf of its staff, declined to comment for this article.) \u201cHe told me that I want to do a kidney transplant,\u201d David later recalled. \u201cI was shocked because that is the first day that I hear about this kidney transplant.\u201d Dupont asked him about his relationship to Sonia and what had motivated him to be a donor; about whether he was working or studying; and about what his parents did for a living.<\/p>\n David gave the answers he had been coached to provide. In court, Dupont recalled that David had been subdued: \u201cWe spoke for perhaps 15 or 20 minutes. His answers were very brief: single sentences, single words. He didn\u2019t really appear to have any understanding of what it was that he was signing up for.\u201d Dupont explained that there were dangers associated with the procedure, such as excess bleeding, infections and blood clots, and \u201ca small risk of death,\u201d as he wrote in his notes. Even if the operation went well, David would have an increased risk of chronic kidney disease and end\u2011stage renal disease. He would require regular follow-ups for the rest of his life to monitor his kidney function, blood pressure and urine protein levels.<\/p>\n Noticing David\u2019s uneasiness, Dupont asked if he was scared to tell the Ekweremadus that he did not want to go ahead. David said he did not want to donate his kidney. It was only when Dupont made clear that the operation would not happen that David finally made eye contact, the doctor testified. \u201cHe was nervous that I would say or imply that the decision not to proceed was his fault. I assured him that confidentiality was paramount and the intended recipient would be told he was unsuitable.\u201d He recalled David saying about Obeta: \u201cHe had not told me anything about this. I would never have agreed to any of this. My body was not for sale.\u201d<\/p>\n Afterward, David told Obeta that he answered what questions he could, but there were some he could not. Obeta was angry. \u201cHe say that if I don\u2019t do this \u2013 he used Igbo language to say this \u2013 if I don\u2019t do this \u2026 I will find it difficult,\u201d David testified. (Obeta insisted to the court that he had discussed the kidney transplant with David before the meeting.) Obeta also told David that he had 1.2m naira, or about \u00a32,000 then, for him if he went through with the operation.<\/p>\n At the end of March, the decision was taken out of their hands. The Royal Free formally ruled out the possibility of allowing David\u2019s transplant operation to go ahead.<\/p>\n David was relieved, but he was still living in limbo. He was not allowed to leave the house, and spent much of his time with Obeta\u2019s kids when he was not doing chores. A few weeks after the Royal Free declined to proceed with the operation, two people came to Obeta\u2019s house to examine David. They asked him to remove his clothes and applied pressure to his stomach. They still wanted to do the transplant, David said, and Obeta told David he had booked him a flight back to Nigeria. David was unsure what they had planned for him. \u201cThat is when I start to become afraid because I don\u2019t know what I am going to do. Because all the plans, everything they are doing is behind my back,\u201d David testified.<\/p>\n As David later told Chukwudi, his childhood friend, he had been in a state of panic. \u201cHe was even crying, he don\u2019t know what to do,\u201d Chukwudi recalled. \u201cEven me, when he was telling me everything, I was crying. I didn\u2019t know what to do. Because if he comes back, he has nothing to do again. He has already sold his market [stock], he used the money to buy some clothes for his trip.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Ike Ekweremadu (left) when he was deputy president of the Nigerian senate in March 2012.<\/span> Photograph: Pius Utomi Ekpei\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n In court, David and Obeta\u2019s accounts of what happened next differed in a few small ways. But the likeliest story is that on 2 or 3 May 2022, a friend of Obeta\u2019s took David to Heathrow airport for a flight back to Abuja. But once he arrived at the airport, David said he decided he could not go back to Nigeria, where he feared he would be coerced into donating his kidney. Despite carrying little more than a used Samsung phone, AirPods, chargers and \u00a327.90 in cash, he fled. He ended up walking around for three days, sleeping outside. He then ran into a stranger on Kingston Road in Staines, who gave him food and let him take a shower in his flat.<\/p>\n On 5 May, David went to nearby Staines police station, where he told officers a story that was mostly fictional. He said he had been begging for money on the streets of Lagos before coming to London, and that he was an orphan with no family in Nigeria. He told officers that the man he had travelled with had promised him money, but that he couldn\u2019t say what the money was for. He said he was only 15. (David would later testify that he was trying to give the impression of being a vulnerable youth with nowhere to live in Lagos, so he wouldn\u2019t be deported.)<\/p>\n According to Chukwudi, who spoke to David not long after he went to the station, a Nigerian woman hosted David at her home when the police released him into protective care. On the call, David still sounded afraid about the attempted kidney transplant, but he said the Nigerian woman was taking him to church. He thought he might even get the chance to go to school.<\/p>\n With David now gone, the Ekweremadus needed a new plan. After consulting with friends and colleagues, they decided on a new transplant location: Turkey. While the Ekweremadus maintain that Sonia had no knowledge of the plan to illegally get a kidney donor, she responded to her father\u2019s WhatsApp messages that had photos of new potential donors. To one photo of two young Black men, Sonia wrote: \u201cOK, that\u2019s fine. Thank you. Are they still more to test?\u201d<\/p>\n Her father told her: \u201cYes, but by the end of the week, I will decide who to proceed with. We will get it right this time.\u201d<\/p>\n Sonia wrote back: \u201cI trust you, daddy, thank you \u2764\ufe0f\u201d. Then she added: \u201cThe dark one looks better, the light one looks like he\u2019ll run away \ud83d\ude02\ud83d\ude02\ud83d\ude02\u201d.<\/p>\n In June 2022, on Father\u2019s Day, Sonia wrote to her father on the family group chat:<\/p>\n \u201cHappy Father\u2019s Day, daddy, you mean the world to us \u2026 You are the best father in the world. I know lots of people say that about their fathers, but mine is really the best \u2026 I pray for long life and prosperity, to be able to see your grandchildren and great-grandchildren in Jesus\u2019 name. Amen. I want to especially thank you for everything you\u2019ve done and are doing regarding this transplant process. You and mummy have gone above and beyond for me, and it never goes unnoticed and unappreciated \u2026 I hope that one day I\u2019ll be able to take care of you, and mummy, the way that you\u2019ve taken care of us all these years (don\u2019t worry, I haven\u2019t forgotten your Range Rover gift).\u201d<\/p>\n Ike replied: \u201cI know you didn\u2019t forget, sweetheart \u2026 I will spare nothing to ensure your good health and comfort. I have the support of mummy on this objective 100%. By the grace of God, you will be out of this challenge before the end of August. It\u2019s a promise. Just be strong for all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n Two days later, Ike and Beatrice Ekweremadu were arrested at Heathrow as they travelled back from Turkey. They were charged with conspiracy to commit human trafficking for the purpose of exploitation, specifically organ harvesting. The couple had at least \u00a330,000 in cash on them. Sonia was arrested the same day at her home in London. Obeta was arrested the next month. Sonia\u2019s uncle Diwe remained in Nigeria and was not extradited to the UK. (I was unable to reach Diwe for comment.)<\/p>\n It is extremely rare for a Nigerian politician of Ekweremadu\u2019s status to face criminal charges. In the UK, the story was widely covered in the media, but in Nigeria, the case attracted a different level of interest, dominating the front pages of newspapers and sparking discussions on primetime TV news, as well as endless social media posts and WhatsApp messages across both Nigeria and the diaspora. One of David\u2019s uncles, Linus, who had given him a place to stay when he first came to Lagos, discovered his nephew\u2019s story on social media like everyone else. \u201cIf I had known, I wouldn\u2019t have allowed him to go,\u201d Linus told me.<\/p>\n On 6 February 2023, the trial of Obinna Obeta and Ike, Beatrice and Sonia Ekweremadu began at the Old Bailey in London. All pleaded not guilty. Ike claimed that he thought David was donating a kidney to his daughter out of kindness, and that he never agreed to pay him. He accused Obeta of scamming him out of money, and he argued that David had lied to the police so that he could get asylum in the UK. \u201cD was never exploited, D accepted and agreed, volunteered to help my daughter with this kidney and we believed him,\u201d Ike told the court. \u201cBut looking back now it was obvious that he was scamming everybody, he just wanted to come to England and take refuge.\u201d<\/p>\n Ike downplayed David\u2019s vulnerability. \u201cLagos is a place where you get wiser by the day for you to survive. So, even a young person in Lagos cannot be intimidated,\u201d he said in court. \u201cBecause they are just streetwise.\u201d When asked if he knew David was selling phone accessories out of a wheelbarrow, he responded: \u201cI didn\u2019t know in particular but that\u2019s also a big business, he\u2019d make millions with that.\u201d<\/p>\n Ike did admit to fabricating the familial relationship to David. \u201cThat is what Dr Obeta advised us,\u201d he said. \u201cMy daughter was sick, and somebody had told us what we would need to do, and we didn\u2019t see any corruption in this; we didn\u2019t corrupt anybody.\u201d Both he and Beatrice kept saying during the trial that their lies to the Royal Free about David\u2019s identity were \u201cnot who we are\u201d \u2013 they were just desperate to save their daughter\u2019s life. \u201cShe was born premature, so we struggled to save her life from day one,\u201d the former senator said. He refused to admit any guilt. When asked if he was the victim in all this, Ekweremadu said: \u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Ike Ekweremadu (left), Dr Obinna Obeta (top right) and Beatrice Ekweremadu on 23 March 2023 after their arrests.<\/span> Photograph: AP<\/p>\n The trial shed more light on Obeta, who had obtained a UK medical visa for his own transplant and then stayed to work in the country illegally, getting a job as a cleaner during the pandemic. \u201cIt was amazing \u2026 I\u2019ve never seen this kind of, you know, surgery skill,\u201d Obeta told the court of his transplant experience. \u201cI want to use this opportunity to thank the people of the UK for saving my life.\u201d But he had seemingly made no arrangements for his donor, Friday, who would have to find his own way as an undocumented immigrant in London, and somehow pay for the lifelong testing and monitoring he would need after donating a vital organ. (No one that I spoke to in Lagos had heard from Friday in years.)<\/p>\n On 23 March 2023, at the end of the six-week trial, Ike and Beatrice Ekweremadu were found guilty of organ trafficking. Ike was later sentenced to nine years and eight months; Beatrice to four and a half years. Sonia, who had also been charged with conspiracy to arrange organ harvesting, was acquitted. Obeta was convicted of organ trafficking and sentenced to 10 years. The Ekweremadu case was the first successful organ-trafficking conviction in the UK under the Modern Slavery Act.<\/p>\n After he testified in court via a video link in February 2023, David vanished. The police had placed him in protective custody, and none of his family or friends in Nigeria knew where he was. He had told the court: \u201cI have no one here [in the UK], no family or friends. I\u2019m having to start my life again. I am wary of new people that come into my life now. My plan now is to work and to get an education and to play football.\u201d<\/p>\n In Lagos, in 2024, I met a childhood friend of David\u2019s, Jeremiah Nwamkpuma. In a beige, shabby office upstairs from the stalls in Ikotun Market, we chatted over the noise of hawkers and shoppers. Nwamkpuma told me that he\u2019d recently visited David\u2019s dad in the family village. \u201c[He] asked me about David. I\u2019m telling him that I\u2019m not hearing from him. He\u2019s crying. Since David left, he\u2019s not heard from him,\u201d Nwamkpuma said. \u201cTension is high in the family.\u201d<\/p>\n The family was confused and hurt that David had disappeared from their lives, even though they understood that he, too, was likely afraid. His parents were angry, Nwamkpuma said. They farmed cassava, plantain, yam and other crops, but had little money. When David was selling cellphones, he would send money back home to help them. \u201cWe\u2019re happy he\u2019s saved, but there\u2019s no proper communication,\u201d Jeremiah Mbah, who is the pastor of a church David occasionally attended, told me. \u201cIt\u2019s as if he\u2019s lost.\u201d<\/p>\n For more than two years no one heard from David, but then last year, he called from the UK. He reached Chukwudi, who was surprised and relieved. \u201cHe wanted to hear from me, and know how his parents are doing. I explained to him that his daddy is very sick, and that they needed him present. But he said there was no way for him to come. He was feeling bad,\u201d Chukwudi told me. In court, David had said that he was concerned about his safety if he returned home. Ekweremadu \u201chas a lot of people that know him. In Nigeria, those people can do anything.\u201d He asked Chukwudi to help with the cost of David\u2019s father\u2019s care. \u201cHe told me that he was going to school. He sounded very good,\u201d Chukwudi said.<\/p>\n David\u2019s father died last August. Nwamkpuma called him to let him know of the death. David cried at the news, Nwamkpuma recalled, but said that he still couldn\u2019t come because of his studies; Nwamkpuma told him to stay.<\/p>\n Chukwudi, Nwamkpuma, and David\u2019s family have tried to reach him since then, with no success.<\/p>\n After her parents were convicted, Sonia gave a short interview to the BBC. She looked poised, wearing understated gold jewellery, with her hair in braids. \u201cIt\u2019s sad. It\u2019s been really hard to really wrap my head around it,\u201d she said. \u201cI understand the conviction, personally I disagree with it. However, that\u2019s from a very biased perspective as their daughter. I would obviously always, always back my parents. However, the law has taken its course, and we just have to now move forward as a family.\u201d She admitted she was aware \u201cto an extent\u201d of her parents\u2019 plan, but that she \u201cdidn\u2019t really know anything leading up to it\u201d. She added that she didn\u2019t \u201cfeel anything\u201d towards David, but wished him \u201call the best\u201d.<\/p>\n She was now in a precarious medical situation. \u201cEither I stay on dialysis for the rest of my life, or I get a transplant; these are my two options,\u201d she said. She had visited her parents in jail, and said they seemed calm. \u201cI feel guilty,\u201d she said, her voice breaking. \u201cBecause I feel like all this has happened because of me.\u201d (Sonia declined to comment for this article, but on her Instagram, she often posts stories with bible verses and prayers, as well as photos with friends.)<\/p>\n The Ekweremadu case is still the only successful conviction for organ trafficking under the Modern Slavery Act in the UK. There is a simple reason that such convictions are rare, particularly in Nigeria, says Frank Tietie, a human rights lawyer: \u201cThose who are involved are usually very powerful people, and they\u2019re able to influence our justice system.\u201d While Ike Ekweremadu remains in prison, Beatrice was released in January, after serving the custodial portion of her sentence. Upon her return to Nigeria, local media reported that she was greeted with celebrations in her home town of Mpu.<\/p>\n Late last year, in a sign of Ike\u2019s continued status in his home country, Nigeria\u2019s foreign minister met with officials at the UK Ministry of Justice to request that he be returned to Nigeria to serve out the rest of his sentence there. The UK rejected the request. Nigeria has arrested and charged several other people with organ trafficking, but the trials have lagged. As Tietie said, \u201cSo it\u2019s still going on, largely unreported, largely unchecked.\u201d<\/p>\n The Long Read magazine summer edition<\/strong><\/p>\n AI in the classroom, vending machines in the canteen, homeless people in the library, no one in the pub. Surprising stories from our strange new world in the new edition of the Long Read magazine. Buy your copy here.<\/em><\/p>\n Listen to our podcasts here and sign up to the long read weekly email here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" David Nwamini arrived in Lagos for the first time in 2016. He had come from a village in Ebonyi, a state in southeastern Nigeria. He was 15 years old, the eldest of nine siblings and his parents were farmers. When he was a boy, his father became sick and David started working to assist his<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":51518,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[1868,761,1661,6012,1541,946,25093,1593,25092,12141,801],"class_list":{"0":"post-51517","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-body","9":"tag-human","10":"tag-london","11":"tag-lured","12":"tag-man","13":"tag-nigerian","14":"tag-organtrafficking","15":"tag-plot","16":"tag-snatchers","17":"tag-trafficking","18":"tag-young"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=51517"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51517\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/51518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=51517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=51517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=51517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}