Leadership of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) disclosed that 112,351 out of the 204,332 cleared passport backlog across the country were yet to be collected .
The acting comptroller-general of the service, Mrs. Caroline Adepoju Wura-Ola, who made the disclosure while briefing newsmen yesterday in Abuja, appealed to applicants, who had applied in any of the passport offices to check their respective centers of application for collection at no cost, before it expires.
Mrs Wura-Ola who further assured that the NIS, under her watch would not relent in its efforts at providing super services to Nigerians, revealed that out of the over 204,332 backlog of passport applications cleared on the orders of the minister of Interior, only 91,981 passports have so far been collected.
She, however, reiterated the service’s determination to remove all bottlenecks in passport application by putting measures such as increasing the number of passport production machines, as well as the involvement of staff in multiple shifts in passport production centers in place.
“I invite applicants who have applied for passports to come and pick them up without paying anything extra,” she said.
The NIS boss who however blamed the high demand for the travel document in the last few years on the ‘Japa syndrome’ in Nigeria, assured applicants that the two-week timeline set by the federal government for the processing of passports would be upheld.
While explaining that both the service and its partners have upgraded their facilities to meet the demand for the international travel document by Nigerians, she revealed that efforts by NIS to make the passport application process fully automated had been concluded by both service and its partners.
In her words, one the process is completed, applicants would only visit passport offices for biometric capturing, as they would have uploaded their photographs on our portal
Speaking on the corruption at the various passport offices, she said, “Corruption is opportunistic, it is made possible where there is exploitive holes, I can assure you that any staff of Nigeria immigration service that is caught in any form of malpractice before performing their statutory duties will be severely punished, I have the directives of the minister of Interior, we will make scape goat out of tyrant officials.”
Adepoju warned applicants to shun touts, and urged them to contact the Service via 08067761196 , should any personnel demand a bribe from them to get a passport.
“Any personnel caught demanding bribes would be severely punished. The Minister has directed that we make a scapegoat of any corrupt official caught,” she said.
She also, however, praised officers and men of the NIS for working day and night including weekends and public holidays to meet up with his directive.
