The United States Department of Homeland Security has said it will deport no fewer than 79 convicted Nigerians listed on its ‘worst-of-the-worst’ criminal list.

Further findings on the DHS website on Monday revealed that the 79 Nigerians were convicted of offences bordering on fraud, drug peddling, assault, manslaughter, and robbery, among others.

An accompanying note showed that the convicts were arrested as part of the United States’ crackdown on criminal immigrants.

The note read, “The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is highlighting the worst of the worst criminal aliens arrested by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“Under Secretary Noem’s leadership, the hardworking men and women of DHS and ICE are fulfilling President Trump’s promise and carrying out mass deportations, starting with the worst of the worst, including the illegal aliens you see here.”

The list showed that the convicted Nigerians include Boluwaji Akingunsoye, Ejike Asiegbunam, Emmanuel Mayegun Adeola, Bamidele Bolatiwa, Ifeanyi Nwaozomudoh, Aderemi Akefe, Solomon Wilfred, Chibundu Anuebunwa, Joshua Ineh, Usman Momoh, Oluwole Odunowo, Bolarinwa Salau, and Oriyomi Aloba.

Others are Oludayo Adeagbo, Olaniyi Akintuyi, Talatu Dada, Olatunde Oladinni, Jelili Qudus, Abayomi Daramola, Toluwani Adebakin, Olamide Jolayemi, Isaiah Okere, Benji Macaulay, and Joseph Ogbara.

Also listed are Olusegun Martins, Kingsley Ariegwe, Olugbenga Abass, Oyewole Balogun, Adeyinka Ademokunla, Christian Ogunghide, Christopher Ojuma, Olamide Adedipe, Patrick Onogwu, Olajide Olateru-Olagbegi, and Omotayo Akinto.

Others include Kenneth Unanka, Jeremiah Ehis, Oluwafemi Orimolade, Ayibatonyе Bienzigha, Uche Diuno, Akinwale Adaramaja, Boluwatife Afolabi, Chinonso Ochie, Olayinka A. Jones, Theophilus Anwana, Aishatu Umaru, and Henry Idiagbonya.

Further names on the list are Okechukwu Okoronkwo, Daro Kosin, Sakiru Ambali, Kamaludeen Giwa, Cyril Odogwu, Ifeanyi Echigeme, Kingsley Ibhadore, Suraj Tairu, Peter Equere, Dasola Abdulraheem, Adewale Aladekoba, and Akeem Adeleke.

Also included are Bernard Ogie Oretekor, Abiemwense Obanor, Olufemi Olufisayo Olutiola, Chukwuemeka Okorie, Abimbola Esan, Elizabeth Miller, Chima Orji, Adetunji Olofinlade, Abdul Akinsanya, Elizabeth Adeshewo, Dennis Ofuoma, and Boluwaji Akingunsoye.

Others are Quazeem Adeyinka, Ifeanyi Okoro, Oluwaseun Kassim, Olumide Bankole Morakinyo, Abraham Ola Osoko, Oluchi Jennifer and Chibuzo Nwaonu.

Trump’s administration has continued to crack down on criminal and illegal immigrants across the US, with many Nigerians in the country affected by the policy.

It was earlier reported that some Nigerians went into hiding while others are returning home secretly over the intensified deportation campaign led by President Donald Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The sweeping actions, which include house-to-house enforcement raids, have stirred panic, debate and protest, particularly following a series of high-profile, deadly incidents involving the federal immigration officers.

The Minister of Defence, Gen. Christopher Musa (retd.), on Sunday disclosed that he was among the intended targets of the recently foiled coup plot against President Bola Tinubu, revealing that the conspirators planned to arrest or shoot him if he resisted.

Musa made the disclosure while speaking as a guest on Politics Today, a Channels Television programme, where he also described the suspects behind the plot as “a bunch of very unserious individuals.”

While admitting that he played a key role in helping security agencies nip the plot in the bud, the former Chief of Defence Staff said he was personally marked for arrest by the plotters.

“I was also a target, I am sure you know. I was supposed to be arrested, and if I refused, I was supposed to be shot,” he said.

“But that’s the job. Anybody who goes into a coup zeroes his mind because he knows if he succeeds, good.

If he doesn’t succeed, whatever consequences come, you are ready for it.”

Musa dismissed the capacity of the suspects to successfully challenge the Nigerian state, saying their actions showed a complete misunderstanding of Nigeria’s democratic history and the strength of its armed forces.

“But again, I think these guys were just a bunch of very unserious individuals that I really don’t know. If you look at the calibre of the individuals, I really don’t know what got into their heads to think that they could take on the armed forces like that,” he said.

He added that even without the intervention of the military, Nigerians would have resisted any attempt to overthrow a democratically elected government.

“What I even said was that even Nigerians would have fought them. Even without the armed forces, Nigerians would have stood against them. Remember how Nigerians fought against the military rule for quite some time. And that’s why Mr. President has always been one of them.

“So now, for them to think they could just wake up one morning and do that in Nigeria, I think something went wrong in there. They need to reset their brains.”

Speaking on the arrests made so far, the Defence Minister said most of those involved had been apprehended, with only “maybe one or two” still at large.

“So far, most of them have been caught. If there’s anyone, maybe one or two. It just started from the colonel himself, who felt disgruntled because he was not promoted. He didn’t meet the marks to be promoted,” he said.

Musa explained that the plot was driven largely by personal grievances, noting that the armed forces’ promotion system is strict and merit-based.

“You know that the armed forces is really very strict about its promotions system. But he didn’t make it. So what he decided to do was probably go around, look at other people that had one issue or the other…with the aim of bringing them in,” he said.

Expressing concern for junior officers allegedly drawn into the plot, Musa said, “My pain is all those young officers who didn’t understand what was going on that he put in this mess. Now they have to face the consequences.

“So everything evolves around him as an individual. But he was just a colonel. I can’t even imagine a colonel ever thinking of doing such a thing.”

The Defence Minister stressed that executing a coup in modern-day Nigeria was virtually impossible, unlike in the past.

“That was in the past. That was Nigeria of yesteryears. It’s impossible,” he said, adding that security agencies relied on verified facts, not speculation, before acting.

“If there’s a situation where you hear that somebody is trying to do something and you walk in, what facts do you have because you are going to go to the courts? If you can’t present it in the courts, then they throw you away. And then you look stupid.”

He said the investigation was thorough and collaborative, involving multiple intelligence agencies to avoid indicting innocent officers.

“Since I was there, I was the one who inaugurated the board. I made sure the board started. We sent them to DIA to do a thorough investigation along with the NIA, DSS, and every other person. So it’s a holistic investigation that was carried out because we didn’t want any innocent person to be indicted,” Musa said.

He dismissed claims that the plot was driven by dissatisfaction with the current administration, insisting it predated Tinubu’s inauguration.

“These things were planned even right before the president took office. So it was a plan they had ahead of him since they knew he was the one who won the election,” he said, describing the development as “quite unfortunate.”

Musa further noted that past coups succeeded only with the backing of top military commanders, a factor completely absent in the current case.

“If you remember, during those days when they had coups, you had to have most of the big boys like the GOCs and service chiefs…You don’t have any of such. They are just very low-ranking individuals that have no access to some of these things,” he said.

“For anybody to want to truncate democracy in this disposition, I think there’s something really wrong with them.”

Bayo Onanuga, Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, has called for vandals of public infrastructure to be shot on sight.

Onanuga made the statement in a post on X on Sunday, while reacting to a video showing damage to an ongoing federal road project.

“Just shoot these unconscionable vandals/thieves at sight. They are the worst species of citizenships,” he wrote.

The video showed men wearing reflective jackets, emblazoned with the crest of the federal ministry of works, narrating how vandals cut and removed starter bars, also known as shoulder rods, at the reconstruction site of the Ibadan-Ilesa/Ife federal highway.

An official in the footage said the vandals removed sections of the iron bars they could access, and cut out others entirely, despite security presence at the site.

“So what happens is that we have some people vandalising these starter bars. You can see that they are pressing in some places, but all these vandals, they cut out of it, they remove the ones they could remove,” he said.

“They cut the ones that are very solid and remove the ones they can remove entirely. These are starter bars. This is a very bad thing they are doing. These are vandals, and we have security patrols.”

The Ibadan-Ilesa/Ife highway is one of the major roads being reconstructed by the federal government.