The children ‘tricked and shipped’ back to Africa
Hannah Adelowo was 11 years old and living in London when her parents told her she was going to leave the UK capital to go to school in New York.
“We have cousins in America and I have always had this view that I want to be in America I have always been so fascinated from watching TV. I just loved the idea of America”.
Ms Adelowo says the night before she was due to leave she could not sleep, “I was so excited”.
It was her first trip abroad and she was travelling with her father. It was only when she seated and ready for take-off that she heard the tannoy announce that the flight was going from London to Lagos.
She had been “tricked and shipped” – a phenomenon that occurs within African communities living abroad where parents trick their kids into going back to their native countries for a variety of reasons.
In Ms Adelowo’s case her parents later told her that her behaviour at school was sullying the family name and as a result she was sent back to Nigeria where she spent five years at a strict boarding school in Ogun State.
