Skip to main content
IMMIGRATION: Nigeria to introduce three new Visa types.



The Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) says it will soon introduce various categories of visas for the country as part of its visa reform.

The Comptroller General of Immigration (CGI), Mohammad Babandede , disclosed this in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Benin.

Mr Babandede said that the visa categories being considered were visa for tourists, visa for retirees outside the country who wish to retire in Nigeria and visa for incentive/investors.

According to him, “If you have money, genuine money, we are encouraging visitors who have intellectual capacity to assist in building capacity in Nigeria.

“If the visa is not going to break national security, good economy, we would encourage it to be delivered in a transparent way to cut corruption.

“We will ensure that Nigerians realise that there is reform based on the anti-corruption strategy of Mr President.”

The official told NAN that the 2019 Comptroller General of Immigration annual conference did a lot of group work towards achieving the various reforms in the Service within the shortest possible time.

He added that there were some quick wins that could be done immediately, noting that one of such was in the area of passport.

“As a quick win, we promised to make the prices of passport available to the public to see and read the price and pay for it.


“One of the quick wins we have done is to standardise the operations of the passport, we want Nigerians to know the process of getting passport and visa on the passport.

"So its not just the reforms, but what is in the reforms is for greater service delivery.
“The important thing is that in each reform we do, we consider national security,” he said.

Mr Babandede said that the current “Operation Swift Response” under the supervision of the office of the National Security Adviser was intended to tackle border insecurity.

He said that the present borders’ closure has helped Nigeria to curtail not just the people who enter, but also Nigerians who take the bush paths to travel without passports.

He disclosed that a month ago, the NIS records showed that not fewer than 11,000 persons have been prevented from travelling out through illegal means.

The CGI added that the service also deported persons who were not supposed to be in the country.

Similarly, Kayode Eniolorunda, the Comptroller, NIS, Edo command, said that the CGI conference was the most important event in the calendar of the service.

Mr Eniolorunda said that this was because far reaching decisions and reform strategies were usually conceived and adopted during the conference.

He said that the state command’s hosting of the 2019 conference was in view of the theme which has to do with migration management and the role of NIS.

He noted that irregular migration like human trafficking and smuggling in persons thrive and was very rampant in the state.

He, however, said that e-registration would commence in the state before the end of the year as equipment and facilities needed were already on the ground.


(Source: NAN)

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Buhari re-appoints Yakubu as INEC Chairman

  The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), has re-appointed Prof Mahmood Yakubu as the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission. The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, disclosed this in a statement on Tuesday titled “President Buhari nominates Prof Yakubu as INEC chairman for second term in office.” The statement read, “President Muhammadu Buhari has presented the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof Mahmood Yakubu, for a second term in office. “In a letter to President of the Senate, Ahmad Ibrahim Lawan, the President said in accordance with the provision of Section 154 (1) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), ‘I am pleased to present for confirmation by the Senate, the nomination of Professor Mahmood Yakubu for appointment as Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for a second and final term.’ “Prof Yakubu was first appointed by P...
Benin Republic set to review Constitution on terms of Political Office. In a year when many countries on the continent and in West Africa are changing their constitutions to allow for incumbent presidents to run yet again, the Beninese National Assembly has approved a major constitutional reform to discuss the precision on the two terms of office of the President of the Republic among other issues. Detailing the political situation of Benin at the floor of the ECOWAS Parliament, the country report presented contained that the constitutions review was to address the current political situation of the country marking a new Republic following two unsuccessful attempts. The report stated that “Benin Republic has after the April 2019 Legislative elections experienced a tense atmosphere following the frustrating feelings from political group who were unable to participate in the legislative elections, due to the inability to meet the requirement on the law on the constit...

IMPLEMENTATION OF NEW SIM REGISTRATION RULES

Following the earlier directive on the suspension of new SIM registration by network operators, the Honourable Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Ali Ibrahim (Pantami) convened an urgent meeting of key stakeholders in the Communications industry on Monday, December 14, 2020.   The meeting had in attendance the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and Management of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), as well as the CEOs and Management staff of all service providers in the industry.   At the meeting, the need to consolidate the achievements of last year’s  SIM registration audit and improve the performance and sanity of the sector was exhaustively discussed and all stakeholders agreed that urgent drastic measures have now become inevitable to improve the integrity and transparency of the SIM registration process.   To this end, t...