Article Summary
- The Nigeria Immigration Service said it has simplified the application process for international passports to make it for Nigerians to apply by themselves.
- The Service also disclosed that 80 of its officers have been on trial for indulging in the collection of illegal fees for the issuance of new passports and renewal of old ones.
The Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) has said that the process of applying for international passports has been simplified such that Nigerians do not need to go through any third party or agents.
The Service Public Relations Officer (SPRO), Comptroller of Immigration, Mr. Tony Akuneme, who disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday, said the Service had tried as much as possible to eliminate third parties so that Nigerians can process the application of their passport from the comfort of their homes, either on laptop or smartphone and pay online.
Third-party issues
While noting that the patronage of third parties has been one of the issues facing the issuance and renewal of passports in the country, Akuneme said:
- “You don’t really need anybody whether immigration officers or agents which we usually call touts. They have upgraded and become agents. They are still third parties. The problem we have is the use of third parties because no matter how much reform you put in, you will always see a learned and civilised person using a third party to process his or her application.
- “And one thing they don’t understand is that third parties don’t have an idea of the information entered into your application. This can result in somebody having issues with his/her National Identification Number (NIN).”
Disclosing that the service has continued to punish its officers and men who try to assist people for a fee, Akunieme said the officers can assist people genuinely without collecting money from them.
- “We are committed to curbing corruption and other illicit acts in the service. You will appreciate the fact that if nothing else, the level of awareness has increased in the last few months.
- “Don’t patronise agents, fill your forms yourself. We have officers watching and these agents know they are being watched. When they take money from you, tell us. Tell the world if we don’t take action,” he said.
80 officers on trial
According to him, no fewer than 80 officers and men of the Service have gone on trial for indulging in the collection of illegal fees for the issuance of new passports and renewal of old ones. He also disclosed that eight other officers have been dismissed from service for the same offence in the last year.
He said the disciplinary measures under the passport reform, was part of the three-point agenda of the present Comptroller General (CG), NIS, Isah Jere, when he came on board. Akuneme also said that the CG’s three-point agenda includes reform passport issuance, tightening border security and improving the welfare of NIS officers.
According to him, Jere has done this to the best of his ability in the last year plus, which has led to most applicants booking online for passports.
The Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola had recently declared that some corrupt officers of the NIS were sabotaging the efforts to fast-track the issuance and renewal of international passports in the country.
Complete nonsense. I live in the UK and work for an agency that handles Nigeria passport applications for individuals. The new website is actually worse than the previous one. At least the previous one would show you after payment where you could print your payment slip and acknowledgement slip the new website doesn’t.
Also payment issues of the website is still an issue. The Nigerian government has a third party organisation called innovate dealing with passport payments who charges $12 surchage for every application and they don’t even have a working telephone number to contact when you make payment for your passport and it’s unsuccessful but the money is deducted from your account.
Fast track in the UK has not be available for 2 years and the average time to get an appointment is 2months, the average time to receive your passport in the mail is 1 months that’s if you do receive it. The high commission demands that all applicants submits envelopes but they don’t mail passports forcing people to return to the high commission to pick it up
The high commission regularly runs out of passport booklets.
All these issues are not the high commission a fault but that of the government. If you provided a service that was direct and helpful there would be no demand for agents as you call them.
Also the NIN situation is just an added complication to the matter that I can be bothered to rant about. I’ve already spent way to much of my time typing this.
It is the same immigration officers that used this agents to reap people off their money. One should be able to get things done by oneself, just for one to get a notification from the immigration office when to be captured and when the passport is ready should be what they need to do. With technology and smart phones, it should be seamless.
They need to work on their service yet we are unable to collect our passport miss a lifetime offer because passport is not yet out