Nigerian government says passport not in short supply

The federal government has stated that Nigeria’s passport booklets are not in short supply.

Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, minister of interior made this known while debunking claims stating otherwise at President Muhammadu Buhari’s Administration’s Scorecard 2015-2023 4th edition.

According to the minister, there are enough booklets available for those who had applied for passports and had been captured or are yet to be captured.

Reason for the hold: The minister said the government stopped the 24-hour passport services because of the criminalities and sharp practices involved in it.

• “Some criminalities had occurred before we came and that has affected the Nigerian psyche on passports. Passports are the most secure identity document of any nation. It is the document that the president of the country attests to on its first page recommending the citizens for good consideration from whoever comes across them. So it is not just a document to play with. It is the symbol of the sovereignty of a nation,’’ he said.

Aregbesola also pointed out that there are differences in the way passports are issued by countries across the globe. He noted In America, it takes 15 weeks to process, in Britain it takes 13 weeks and Japan is the country that has the shortest period for passport processes in the world as it takes just one week.

According to him, the minimum period for processing a passport in Nigeria is six weeks in order to allow the appropriate authority to carry out diligent security checks.

Challenges: The minister of interior said that the real challenge with the passport application process is the bottleneck in the processing system, especially in major cities.

• “I will not deny the fact that we do not have enough processing centers and we’re working on that. Lagos and Abuja are so problematic because we have limited processing centers. Lagos has three processing centers whereas the state ought to have a minimum of 20 processing centers.
• “We are working on a partnership with the private sector to provide only front office services where Nigerians can readily and easily do capturing for their passports while the main issuance will be for the Immigration.”

The minister also reassured Nigerians within and outside the country of efficient service delivery in the issuance of international passports.