Many Nigerians resident within and outside the country have taken turns to testify to the new Nigerian international passport processing regime across the Nigerian immigration services (NIS) passport centres, both within Nigeria and abroad.
According to them, the speed of passport processing, since inception of the reform initiatives of the interior minister, Hon. (Dr.) Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, is unprecedented in the history of the Nigerian immigration services (NIS) passport production.
One of them, Mrs Gbemisola Oyekan Fasasi, a Nigerian who lives and does businesses in Sweden took to her Facebook page on October 21st, to commend the new development.
She said, “Yesterday was nothing short of epic. I arrived the Nigerian embassy in Stockholm at 2:55pm for passport renewal, I snapped and received my new passport at exactly 3:10pm!. 15mins! Waoh! The only record that beat this is the Swedish passport, which takes approximately 3-5minutes to complete! Impressive job from the team at Nigerian embassy Sweden.”
Another Nigerian, Esther Chukwu, who applied and got her passport in five days, also went on her verified Facebook page on Thursday September 2nd to testify.
“My 10 Years Validity Passport is Ready.
I applied online and made payment on Sunday. Did my biometrics on Monday
Got it today being Thursday.
It took just 5 days,” she wrote.
Again, a certain Prince Adedoyin B. Alatishe, on the 30th of October, also went on his verified twitter (X) page with his testimony and accolades to the minister.
“I can’t lie, the new minister of interior is showing workings. I applied for my passport upper Friday. No premium nothing. They told me it was ready last Thursday. I just picked it up now,” he said.
“Another twitter (X) user with the handle @inamitegroup, corroborated by saying;
“Truth, the man really work his words, I did captured for a fresh passport on Thursday and picked up the passport the next week Friday”.
Hon. (Dr) Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo had on the 7th of September 2023, few days after his resumption in office as the minister of interior, given the nigerian immigration services (NIS) a two weeks deadline to clear all pending passport applications within the country. 59,962 of them were cleared within four working days, and on the 1st of October, the (NIS) announced that the entire 204,332 passport backlogs had been cleared.
According to the acting comptroller-general of the immigration services, Caroline Adepoju, the new development is a result of the minister’s reform initiatives, after a comprehensive research on the passport production process.