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The Federal Government of Nigeria has reviewed the timeline for passport application processing as carried out by the Nigeria Immigration Service (hereinafter referred to as the “NIS”) to six weeks.The said review will come into full implementation from 1stJune, 2021.

Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola made announcement at a meeting with the Comptroller-General of Immigration, Mr. Mohammad Babandede, the Passport Control Officers, and the attaches in Nigeria Missions abroad, at the Immigration Headquarters,Sauka, Abuja, on Thursday, 22nd April, 2021.

According to the Minister, the review will ensure a seamless, transparent operation and as well as accord human dignity to applicants and fulfill citizenship integrity in line with the mandate of the ministry. It has no doubt become imperative to review the ministry’s operations and rejig its system in order to offer excellent services to clients.

Going further, he stressed that “A timeline will be fixed for every application i.e., a collection date. This will be six weeks, comparable to what obtains in other countries,” “This is to allow for enough time to investigate and validate personal information supplied by the applicants.

“What we are driving at is the peace of mind that comes from the assurance of certainty. If there are circumstances that will make the date change, it will be communicated to the applicant one week before the collection date.

“Applicants will have no basis for further communication with officers, other than to complete their application process and leave the venue. The date for the collection of their passports or any challenge to the application will be communicated to them. The technology for the efficient running of this system has been acquired and will be deployed.”

Mr. Aregbesola also said “We have had several challenges in the past, including shortage of booklets, touting, racketeering, inflating the cost, passports being issued to ineligible persons, among others,” According to him, efforts were on to embed security operatives both seen and unseen, in all passport offices who would wear body cameras to detect and report any form of solicitations, inflation, improper communications, extortion, diversion, hoarding, and other corrupt practices. He promised that those caught will be dealt with according to the law.

The minister said an ombudsman will also be created for members of the public for them to receive complaints and reports on officers trying to deviate from prescribed guidelines and subversion of the process.

There will be a zero-tolerance stance to all forms of touting. No applicant will be made to pay any illegitimate fees.

The Minister added that the NIS will publish a list of the backlog of applications that are ready, which have not been collected by the owners on their website. These applicants are required to go to the state commands to collect them. This is indeed an incredible forward flip in the immigration sector. This new regime does not only create an environment for certainty when applying for a passport, it also helps in the prediction of when same will be issued particularly, in the corporate space (when scheduling to meet a deadline for a cross-border physical business engagement).

Despite this laudable initiative, the government must now ensure the policy is not only consummated fully driven to meet its set objectives, as anything short of an actual implementation would impeded the intended benefits of the well thought out immigration policy.

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