Alhaji Muniru, a Ghanaian currently based in Dubai, shared his challenging migration journey on SVTV Africa’s Daily Hustle Worldwide show with DJ Nyaami.
He narrated that he lived in Saudi Arabia for 12 years before returning to Ghana. With hopes of relocating to Canada, he paid an agent $12,000 for a visa. According to the deal, he was to pay 40% of the amount (GHC 36,000) upfront and pay the remaining balance upon arrival in Canada. Unfortunately, after waiting for a year, the Canadian embassy refused his visa application. The agent refunded only GHC 22,000, causing him a major financial loss.
Determined to find work, Alhaji Muniru was introduced to a woman who claimed she could help him travel to Dubai for a job. She charged him GHC 35,000, promising he would earn that back within 5-6 months. She assured him that the job involved loading luggage at Dubai Airport and that she would only process the visa if the job was available.
However, things quickly went wrong. She processed a visit visa instead of a work visa. When he arrived in Dubai, he was stranded at the airport for hours. Eventually, someone picked him up and took him to a “hotel,” which turned out to be a cramped shared room with eight beds.
He gave the man who brought him $200, but no job followed. Despite presenting multiple licenses (including butcher and driving licenses), he was told to wait. Days passed with no updates, and both the woman and the agent in Ghana stopped responding to his calls.
Later, he was offered a cleaning job, which he initially refused. The agent in Ghana then instructed him to accept any offer and even arranged for him to sleep in a kitchen, claiming she had rented it out. He noticed the same agent posting on social media about hiring 10 people for warehouse jobs in Dubai — jobs he was still desperately searching for.
Eventually, he was moved from the kitchen to another location, but the landlady seized his luggage over unpaid rent. He ended up sleeping outside before relocating to the Al Baraha and Union areas. The woman later blocked him and removed him from all communication groups.
Alhaji Muniru is now jobless in Dubai. He says people disrespect him, and someone even tried to get him a “houseboy” job. One company agreed to help him and took his passport, claiming they had applied for an employment visa and requested 3,500 dirhams.
After staying over a month without a job, he is now broke, homeless, and sleeping in someone’s office. He said he recently underwent medicals and fingerprinting for the employment visa process, which also cost him 1,000 dirhams.
Alhaji Muniru feels deeply betrayed, especially since the woman who duped him is a fellow Muslim and knew his family. He’s calling for help, saying he can’t afford a plane ticket back to Ghana and is pleading for support to either return home or secure a proper job legally in Dubai.
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