With long queues of hundreds of Nigerians waiting to collect their international passports without success in its offices nationwide on daily basis, the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) has blamed the scarcity of booklets on the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN’s) foreign exchange (FX) policy.
The Comptroller-General of the Service, Mr. Idris Jere, who accused the apex bank for the lingering scarcity of the travel document at a public hearing organised on Tuesday by an Ad-Hoc Committee of the House of Representatives in Abuja, contradicted the earlier position of the Minister of Interior, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, who, claimed about a week ago that the NIS had never experienced any shortage of the international passport booklets.
During the public hearing session, the NIS’ Comptroller-General explained that the CBN’s refusal to grant the Service’s request to access FX for the importation of the passport booklets was primarily causing the scarcity, thereby delaying the process of renewal and issuance of the travel document.
The NIS’ boss clarified: “We generate forex from the sale of passports, but we do not have access to buy the same booklet, and that is a challenge for NIS.
“The factors responsible for the scarcity of passports include the inability to set up passport-producing factories in Nigeria as its production is done abroad.
“The major seven components used for producing passports are sold in the international market, and the assemblage and production are done in Malaysia”, Jere added.
According to him, Irris Smart Technology Ltd., the foreign company producing the Nigerian international passport, has creditably performed given the conditions.
While describing the presidential directive mandating the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting (NSPM) to be producing the international passport as a welcome development, the NIS’ Director-General, however, advised the government on the need for a proper transition plan to enable the NSPM takeover the project without any breach of contract with the foreign company.
