{"id":99582,"date":"2026-07-07T10:27:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T10:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=99582"},"modified":"2026-07-07T10:38:29","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T10:38:29","slug":"nans-gives-south-african-businesses-four-day-ultimatum-to-exit-nigeria-over-xenophobic-attacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=99582","title":{"rendered":"NANS Gives South African Businesses Four-Day Ultimatum to Exit Nigeria Over Xenophobic Attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"

The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has issued a four-day ultimatum to South African business interests operating in Nigeria to leave the country, citing renewed xenophobic attacks against Nigerians and other African nationals in South Africa.<\/p>\n

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South Africa companies in Nigeria. Photo courtesy of allAfrica.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The ultimatum, announced on Monday in Enugu by the National Executive Director for Corporate and Private Sectors Engagement, Bestman Okereafor, follows growing outrage over reports of attacks, intimidation and the alleged killing of Nigerians in South Africa amid rising anti-immigrant sentiments.<\/p>\n

Okereafor warned that failure by South African-owned businesses to comply with the directive would attract coordinated protests and other actions by what he described as over 43.1 million Nigerian students across the country.<\/p>\n

“The attention of the apex students governing body, NANS, has been drawn to continuous attacks, intimidation and subsequent chase of law-abiding, peaceful and hardworking Nigerians and other Africans from South Africa.<\/p>\n

“As the biggest students’ body in Africa, we are giving South African business interests four days to evacuate our beloved country, Nigeria.<\/p>\n

“The reason for this action is simple. South Africans cannot continue to oppress and chase our people from their country and expect their businesses to thrive on our soil,” Okereafor said.<\/p>\n

The ultimatum affects several prominent South African companies with significant investments in Nigeria, including telecommunications giant MTN Nigeria, pay television operator MultiChoice Nigeria (owners of DStv and GOtv), Stanbic IBTC Bank\u2014a subsidiary of South Africa’s Standard Bank Group\u2014and Protea Hotels, among others.<\/p>\n

Although NANS did not accuse the companies of any wrongdoing, the student body argued that South African businesses should not continue to enjoy a conducive operating environment in Nigeria while Nigerians allegedly face hostility in South Africa.<\/p>\n

NANS said Nigerian students would be mobilised to shut down South African-owned businesses across the country if the ultimatum expires without a satisfactory response.<\/p>\n

Okereafor added that the association would begin with the picketing of South African business interests before considering further actions.<\/p>\n

The student body also called on the Federal Government of Nigeria and the African Union (AU) to take firmer diplomatic measures against South Africa over what it described as persistent hostility toward citizens of other African countries.<\/p>\n

According to NANS, Nigeria’s historic support for South Africa during the anti-apartheid struggle should not be repaid with what it termed “disloyalty, disrespect and global embarrassment.”<\/p>\n

“It is on record that Nigeria played a major role in support of South Africa during the apartheid struggle and should never be paid with disloyalty, disrespect and global embarrassment,” the statement added.<\/p>\n

Rising tensions over xenophobia
\nThe latest threat from NANS comes amid renewed tensions over xenophobic violence in South Africa, where anti-immigrant protests and attacks have reportedly targeted foreign nationals, including Nigerians, Ethiopians, Somalis and Zimbabweans.<\/p>\n

Recent reports indicate that several Nigerians have been assaulted, displaced and forced to abandon businesses during the unrest. The Nigerian government has previously evacuated some citizens willing to return home following earlier waves of xenophobic violence.<\/p>\n

The development also revives memories of previous diplomatic tensions between Nigeria and South Africa, particularly during the widespread xenophobic attacks of 2008, 2015 and 2019, which prompted retaliatory protests in Nigeria and strained relations between Africa’s two largest economies.<\/p>\n

As of the time of filing this report, there has been no official response from the South African High Commission in Nigeria or the affected South African companies regarding the NANS ultimatum.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has issued a four-day ultimatum to South African business interests operating in Nigeria to leave the country, citing renewed xenophobic attacks against Nigerians and other African nationals in South Africa. The ultimatum, announced on Monday in Enugu by the National Executive Director for Corporate and Private Sectors Engagement, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":99584,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5783,7],"tags":[1302,4872,886,316,8497],"class_list":["post-99582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","category-education","category-news","tag-four","tag-mtn","tag-nans","tag-south-africa","tag-stanbic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=99582"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99582\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":99587,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99582\/revisions\/99587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/99584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=99582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=99582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=99582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}