Despite the endless complaints about the challenges of
processing passports through the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) website, the
Federal Government has revealed ongoing plans to completely digitalised the
process.
While addressing State House correspondents on Thursday, the Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola said the
move is aimed at ending the use of agents and racketeers within the system.
He noted that the
Ministry was working to halt in-person documentation of information before the
end of the current administration by May 29, 2023.
“On Passport issuance,
we are digitalizing the process and when this process is done, applicants do
not need to bring in any documents. You can process the issuance online,
completely.
“You don’t need an agent
and there will be no racketeering, you have to hack into the system to assess.
It is on now, but we will do it before we leave,” he revealed.
The minister admitted
that the challenges surrounding the issuance of passports are “human-induced”,
but it had not eroded the success of the Service. According to him, over 1.7
million passports were issued to Nigerians in 2022 alone.
“When you look at the number of applications,
vis-a-vis the number of passports produced, we are over 80 percent,” he said.
Aregbesola also addressed the issue of Nigerians in the diaspora
currently experiencing difficulty in returning home due to expired passports.
He disclosed that the ministry was in talks with the Foreign
Affairs Ministry to produce electronic temporary passports where Nigerians in
the diaspora with an expired passport can still return home.
“On the temporary passport, we have issues with our sister
ministry: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we are solving it, and when it is fully
solved, our citizens outside Nigeria, when they have emergencies to come, and
they don’t have a current passport.
“We have introduced a regime of returning home with an expired
passport but as much as that won’t be a problem for us to take at our
registration desk, some airlines might be difficult.
“So, we are discussing with South Africa. They do not permit the
use of expired passports as a nation contrary to ICAO (The International Civil
Aviation Organisation)’s regulation that says every citizen to a nation, dead
or alive cannot be denied entry into his home which is logical.
“But the last time I sent a file to them, they said if the
passport is not current, you cannot be taken in or out of their space.
“To avoid that, we introduced what we call temporary electronic
passport – a one-way passport to return home. If you just have the data page on
your passport, bring it to the embassy, at the rate of an appropriate fee, and
you will get home,” he noted.
The minister added that the temporary passport is similar to the
regular passport but it has only a page to bring Nigerians home. He noted, “Unfortunately, we are still in negotiation with the foreign affairs
ministry”.
The NIS, since 2015 has 774 offices across the country, and
mission abroad, 37 state commands and eight zonal offices.
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