Mrs Wura-Ola Adepoju, the Acting Comptroller General of Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), during a press briefing at the Service headquarters on Thursday in Abuja, disclosed that 112,351 passport booklets are yet to be collected by applicants across the 36 states of the federation and the FCT, saying that the figure was as at Oct. 5, 2023.
Adepoju, while answering questions asked, said the service had cleared all the 204,332 passport application backlogs after the Minister of Interior Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo’s two-week deadline for the Service.
She said, “91,981 passport booklets had been collected so far. There are 112,351 others not yet collected.”
The NIS boss called applicants to their respective application centres to collect the travel documents.
“I invite applicants who have applied for passports to come and pick them up without paying anything extra,” Adepoju said.
The Ag. CG, who observed a high demand for travel documents in the last few years due to the ‘Japa syndrome’ in Nigeria, assured that the two-week timeline set by the Minister to process passports would be adhered to.
“The Service and its partners had upgraded their facilities to meet the demand for the document by Nigerians.
“NIS is working with its partners to make the passport application process fully automated, and when the process is completed, an applicant would only visit a passport office for biometric capturing, ” she said.
Adepoju warned applicants to shun touts, urging them to contact the Service via 08067761196 if any personnel demand a bribe from them to get a passport.
