90 Nigerians deported from South Africa for immigration offences

South Africa has deported 90 Nigerians on Friday for committing immigration-related offences.

The 90 deportees were dropped off from Johannesburg by a South African Airways flight at the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos, the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) confirms.

The Lagos Airport Police spokesperson DSP Joseph Alabi told NAN that most of the all-male deportees were living in South Africa without valid documents.

This is the second mass deportation after a February 28 exercise when 97 Nigerians including two females were deported from South Africa, NAN reports.

There is a growing number of Nigerian communities in South Africa. Some of them have suffered a series of xenophobic attacks in parts of Johannesburg and Pretoria since 2008.

The attackers blame the Nigerians and other African nationals of involving in criminal activities in the country.

Mass deportation of Africans within the continent is rare.

This month, 258 Nigerians returned home from crisis-hit Libya as part of a voluntary repatriation exercise facilitated by the Nigerian government and the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).

253 migrants had been repatriated earlier in April.