…Gives contractors January 1 Deadline To Activate Foreign Passport Offices
Nigerians who have been having problems collecting their international passports can now go and pick them up at the various passport offices across the country. This is because the backlogs that have been stalled at the passport offices have been processed and are now ready for collection.
Speaking on Channels Television’s programme ‘Politics Today’ on Wednesday, in Abuja, the Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, says 204,322 international passports are now ready for collection out of the backlog of over 300,000 he met on assumption of office.
He said as of Wednesday only, 99,901 had been collected out of the amount ready for collection and therefore urged Nigerians to pick up their uncollected passports.
The minister also disclosed the Ministry of Interior was working with the immigration service and their vendors to ensure that from next year, international passports are delivered directly to the preferred address of Nigerians.
He also disclosed that he has given contractors January 1 Deadline To Activate Foreign Passport Offices
According to Tunji-Ojo, failure to activate the passport offices amounts to the contractors lacking the capacity to implement their contracts.
He noted that the failure of contractors to implement passport offices was partly responsible for the backlog of passports in several countries, including the United Kingdom.
“What we’re looking at, for example, in Canada: for a start, we should have about three, four offices. We might not, at this particular point in time, be able to say, ‘We want to spend money to open all these things’ but we can partner with the private sector,” he said.
“Incidentally, that service – the passport front office – is actually in the contract signed by the NIS with some service providers over a time ago but still not yet activated. And I have told them, ‘By January 1, God bless you, if you do not activate these services.’”
According to him, failure to activate the passport offices amounts to the contractors lacking the capacity to implement their contracts.
“And you will not hold millions of Nigerians in the diaspora to ransom by not being able to provide them the service you ought to provide,” the minister added.
On last year’s attack on the Kuje Correctional Centre in Abuja, he said it is a national security issue and that the Federal Government is on top of it.
“Kuje Prison Attack National Security Issue, Says ‘Govt Is On Top Of It”
On the night of July 5, 2022, the prison was attacked by suspected Boko Haram terrorists who freed hundreds of inmates, including all 64 insurgents who had been incarcerated.
He noted that the government had the situation under control.
Asked to give an update since the attack, the minister said, “These are national security issues with gross implications on our collective security. So, these are not issues I will be able to discuss on camera, but I tell you, the government is on top of it and we have it under control.”
On the overpopulation of correction centres across the nation, he noted that there are ongoing efforts to decongest the facilities.
“We’ve looked at the roll and we discovered that we have 4,000 of the inmates in due to their inability to pay fines. So, we have been able to separate that,” he said.
“We’re already working with some CSOs, some agencies, and some companies as a matter of CSR just to be able to see how we can sort that out. So, we’re already working on that at least to be able to get these 4,000 out of the correctional service.”
According to him, there are approximately 70,000 inmates nationwide.
He noted that more than 80 percent of inmates are state offenders as opposed to federal offenders, adding that the Federal Ministry of Interior has to collaborate with the state governments.
Explaining that the correctional services are on the concurrent list, not the exclusive list, Tunji-Ojo stated that a committee had been set up to look into the congestion problems.
“I can assure you that we’ll come up with verifiable steps and action plan in due course,” he promised.
On Prison Service vs. Correctional Service, the minister explained that one of the differences between the prison service and the correctional service was the introduction of non-custodial centres.
“This is something we’re already working on. We have done our homework as a ministry and we will take it up to the appropriate level,” he said.
“From our own anticipation and estimation, if we’re able to introduce the non-custodial services, we should be able to decongest our correctional centres by 43 percent further. That brings the number of inmates that we will have to about 42,000.
“That brings it down a bit more and it helps us to solve the problem of congestion and overcrowding of our correctional centres.”
olusola Bello