Nigerians have of recent been finding it difficult to renew or obtain their international passports at the Nigerian Immigration Service offices nationwide. LANRE ADEWOLE and CLEMENT IDOKO report that the reasons given for the problem vary, even as citizens continue to be frustrated despite paying fees far higher than the official rate for the elusive passports.
Early last week, the Minister of Internal Affairs, Rauf Aregbesola, revealed that issuance of the international e-passport for Nigerians would resume at National Immigration Service offices nationwide by the end of the month and that as from June 1, obtaining the e-passport would only take six weeks.
However, for quite some time making efforts to obtain an international passport is like forcing a camel through the eye of a needle. The story about scarcity of the booklets now has a twist to it as those who were ready to play ball and part with some money could still get their passports in due course.
According to an official of the NIS who spoke with Sunday Tribune, price of 64-page e-passport with 10-year validity costs NGN70,000, while the 32 page on the other hand costs N25,000. But at some NIS offices in the South-West, Nigerians were being asked to pay as high as NGN25,000 for the 32-page national identification document.
Beginning of scarcity
Before now, the passport used by Nigerians, the Machine Readable Passport (MRP) was produced locally by the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Plc. At that time, there were no embedded chips in the booklets. However, some years back, precisely in 2003 during the President Olusegun Obasanjo administration, an attempt was made to domesticate the printing of the document which is now going to be an electronic passport, following the signing of Memorandum of Understanding with IRIS Smart Technologies Limited and Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company, to address this challenge of perennial scarcity of the document.
A former Minister of Interior, Abdulrahman Dambazau, who spoke at the time of signing the agreement said the new development would ensure the “availability of passport booklets and there will be no more complaints of shortage or delivery beyond 48 hours after application.” Unfortunately this effort had not materialised.
However, form Sunday Tribune investigation, the major cause of the scarcity of the passport booklets today is foreign exchange problem. According to NIS Comptroller General, Muhammed Babandede, the contract for the production of the e-passport awarded to Iris Smart Technology had three components of the agreement, which are the supply of booklets, maintenance and the technology.
“In terms of booklet, it is the number of booklets they supply that we pay for. They took their money and invest in it and they supply booklets, we pay. That is the nature of the contract,” he said.
Babandede noted that NIS now has over 57 passport offices in the world while some countries have only about three. According to him, these locations pay for their passports in dollars that goes directly into the Federal Consolidated Revenue Account, which NIS has no access to. What this means is that the Immigration Service relies solely on the money generated from passports in Nigeria for all its operations across the world and this explains why the NIS is handicapped to procure enough booklets that could serve the needs of Nigerians both at home and abroad.
For many Nigerians, Abuja’s moniker as Centre of Unity has proven to be apt in their pursuance of obtaining their international passports, as Sunday Tribune investigations revealed that many have left their home states to try their luck at the NIS headquarters at Sauka, in the Federal Capital. This situation has led to a large concentration of touts at the passport office who have virtually taken over the process of acquiring the travel document while working in collaboration with insiders to extort applicants.
Two young men in their 30s from Osun State who spoke with Sunday Tribune said they had spent about four days waiting for their 64-page passport that is taking months to get ready.
One of them, who simply gave his name as Tope, said that at the Osogbo Office of NIS, the passport booklets were not available making him and his friend to try Abuja. They both left Ekiti State for Abuja hoping to get the document in two days; but by the fourth day when Sunday Tribune had an encounter with them, they were still living on hope.
He lamented that he and his friend paid N8,000 for transport to Abuja and were paying N7,000 per night for accommodation excluding feeding for the four days they had stayed.
“We wanted to obtain the 32-page passport booklet but we were told that it was not available, so, we decided to go for the 64-page. The man who is assisting us said the price is N50,000 and that is what each of us paid. He told us the 32-page is N40,000 but that this has not been available since January,” he moaned.
A young man who ‘assists’ applicants at the NIS office also confirmed the price tags given by Tope, adding that if any applicant wanted the document urgently he or she would have to part with an additional N10,000 to be paid to the officers handling the processing of the document.
A woman who lamented to Sunday Tribune that she paid N25,500 for the 32-page passport since January 2021 is yet to get the document just like many other applicants. An Immigration officer who confided in the Sunday Tribune said that limited copies of the 32-page passport were last printed on 18th of January, 2021, while the 64-page booklets, also limited in number, were reserved for “VIPs”.
Hand in-glove business
At the Ikeja Passport office in Lagos, touting remains the strategy in approaching prospective clients. Recently, Sunday Tribune was at the passport office, in company with an applicant who wanted help to avoid being scammed or ripped off.
The applicant, Timilehin, is a barely literate phone repairer. He decided to seek for help after a supposed friend’s brother who agreed to process the passport for him asked him to pay an amount which was almost triple of the official amount. After being properly counseled to avoid both official and unofficial touting, Sunday Tribune went with him as an eye-witness.
From the car park, which is almost directly opposite the building, where a flat rate of N400 is charged on each vehicle, touts, operating under the guise of offering ancillary services like wait-and-get passport photos and photo-copying of original documents, often approach intending applicants directly or subtly, depending on the personalities being courted.
At the information counter, immigration officials were seen idling away, due to power outage and subsequent suspension of data capturing, which has become the most problematic of the process, alongside the alleged scarcity of booklets, particularly the much-in-demand 32-page booklet. A sparse crowd of expectant applicants were also waiting, hoping that power would be restored.
An officer (name withheld) who attended to Timi and Sunday Tribune was initially evasive and was going to be telling the much-recycled story of booklet scarcity among other operational problems, when Sunday Tribune’s identity was made known to him. He became courteous, saying the spokesperson for the command wasn’t in, while explaining the command chain, which precludes him from volunteering official information to the press.
At that point, he agreed to handle Timilehin’s case and after certifying his documents correct, he promised he was in a safe hand. But after Sunday Tribune left the scene, another round of transaction, according to the applicant, took place with the uniformed officer, now handing him over to a man in mufti for ‘documentation’.
Timi told Sunday Tribune the new man, who appeared to be running a quasi-business centre around the complex, charged him a few thousands of naira extra, outside of the official rate already paid. A lady officer also compelled him to drop money for “drink”. A thousand naira also went into the forced entertainment.
Going by Timilehin’s understanding of the scenario, the officer and the man in mufti, have some kind of business relationship. Possibly due to the inability of the official to overcharge the applicant (since Sunday Tribune has come into the picture) as is the practice, Timilehin’s passport was delayed for weeks before he was called upon to come for it, though he was captured the same day, despite the initial claim of technical hitch.
Timilehin’s experience is what most Nigerians face on a daily basis at the Nigerian Immigration Services offices across the nation. If some got their passports at all, it took months sometimes and lots of extra unofficial fees.
In Ilorin, Kwara State, despite the N28,000 official fees, applicant often pay between N50,000 and N70,000 to procure international passports. Sunday Tribune learnt that only recently was a backlog of passports released to applicants as the last set of passports issued from the Ilorin office was on December 2, 2020.
”The recent statement that international passport can be obtained within two days is an irresponsible and unfortunate one because it does not reflect the true reality of what is on ground.
For instance, the last passports we issued from this office was in December 2, 2020, until about two weeks ago when few passports issued to applicants following directive of the minister to clear backlogs of passports in immigration offices.
“To make matters worse, we have shortage of passport booklet. So, those that have already been captured will have to wait until there is booklet and that we can’t guarantee when it’s going to be. That is just the pathetic situation we have found ourselves here.
‘’I have over 70 clients that have been captured but yet to get booklets. Even our seniors do confirm to us that they also have to tip those in Abuja in the process and we make some of our clients who are ready to part with something to understand the situation. For now, there are no booklets available but we have to keep on capturing people which is what you see us doing now. So that once it is available, we call them to come and get it. But it they have not done this process, then we might not be able to help,’’ an official of the NIS told Sunday Tribune under the condition of anonymity.
There are also allegations that officers of the Immigration office always approach applicants to strike business deals with them, by assuring that the process can be fast-tracked if the applicants showed serious interest.
An applicant who has been captured and presented with a slip containing his particulars at the immigration office, Ilorin last week, told Sunday Tribune that he was introduced to an official by one of the travel agencies and he has been told that his passport will be ready in two days if he paid N70,000
‘’I paid N70,000 for my passport a day before now and I have been told that it will be ready in two days time. As you can see, I have been captured and they have given me a slip. So I am waiting,’’ he said.
An official in the Public Relations unit of the NIS, Ilorin, who was approached by Sunday Tribune for reactions on the experiences of the applicants, said he does not the authority to do so, saying: ‘’Please, you have to get to our headquarters in Abuja for any official comment.”
Ibrahim Daniel, an applicant in Jos is in a fix. This is because he is yet to get the passport booklet he applied for two months ago just as his plan of travelling out of the country later this year is gradually going up in smoke.
“I have been coming here virtually every week in the past two months, it is the same story. There are quite a lot of peo ple going through this experience. I am appealing to the Federal Government to address this issue and making the passport available,” he said.
A parent identified as Christiana Musa is also unhappy over the passport issue. According to her, “My son needs this passport within the next one month to travel to Australia to further his education. Otherwise, he might forfeit the admission. I am appealing to the authorities concerned to consider the plight of those in need of this passport and make it available.”
Officials of the NIS were not ready to talk to Sunday Tribune at their Jos office. However, a senior official who spoke on the condition of anonymity refuted the allegation that the booklets were not available. He alleged that prospective applicants were the ones who failed to follow due process. He added that the problem was being and applicants could get their passports within 48 hours.
“Some of these applicants should be sincere and tell the truth. Some of them are yet to registered or obtain their National Identification Numbers (NIN), while others supply incorrect data while completing their application forms. They cannot issue international passport booklets without potential applicants supplying their NIN,” he said.
One of the unfortunate situations of the passport scarcity is that opportunities are being lost daily and that is what may happen to Faith Oduola, a first time applicant if her application does not sail through within a short time from now.
“This is my first time of applying for my international passport, had it been I was told back then that it would become difficult as this, I would have done it then, but at the same time, I do not feel obtaining one’s passport should become impossible.
“I had to forfeit a Master’s programme I wanted to apply for because I could not get my passport done; I went to the passport office at Gate in Ibadan, only for me to be told that I would have to come back because there was no booklet. At some point I heard that it can be processed in Lagos, I had to travel to Lagos again, only to meet the same sad tales. The Master’s programme is time bound, and there is nothing I can do because the international passport is an essential part to the processing.
“Only God knows when they would make the booklets available, because I am very sure there are other frustrated citizens like me that need the passport desperately and urgently,” she lamented.
The story is the same for Adufe Tolami, a nurse and Christianah Odebode, a retiree. Both have been making repeated calls at the NIS office in Ibadan to obtain their passports without success. For Mrs Odebode it was an unthinkable situation for a country to lack the materials for international passports for its citizens.
“My husband and I went to the passport office in Ibadan around January, to renew our international passport, we did all the necessary things needed but we were told that booklet isn’t available that we would have to be patient. The booklet to process the international passport renewal is not available and they do not know when it would be made available by the federal government. This is May and nothing has been done. It’s quite unusual for a country as developed so to speak would run out of booklets to process international passports for her/its citizens,” Mrs Odebode lamented.
For now, no one knows when the scarcity would end. The already frustrated applicants would have loved to have the Internal Affairs minster’s words about the end of May promise to get thing up and running again come true. But then, this is Nigeria where promises are not often kept.
- Additional reports by Biola Azeez, Isaac Shobayo and Adeola Otemade
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