Senate Backs NIS Passport Production Centralisation, Says it will Strengthen Security, End Alleged Extortion

• NIS Explains Central facility produces 1,000 passports hourly, Says  Kano migration not targeted at North

• Kawu after Senate fact-finding visit clarifies new system will eliminate delays, corruption

• Service says all passport centres remain open, assures applicants of faster, more transparent processing

Sunday Aborisade in Abuja

The Chairman, Senate Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream), Senator Abdulrahman Kawu Sumaila, has endorsed the Nigeria Immigration Service’s (NIS) centralised passport production system.

The Senator who is representing Kano Central in the Senate, described the reform as a major step towards strengthening national security, eliminating extortion and improving efficiency in the issuance of international travel documents.

Kawu gave the endorsement yesterday after leading a Senate delegation on a fact-finding visit to the NIS headquarters in Abuja, following complaints by his constituents and other Nigerians over the relocation of passport production from Kano and other parts of Northern Nigeria to a central facility in the Federal Capital Territory.

The senator said the visit had enabled him and others to establish that the complaints were largely based on misconceptions about the ongoing migration of passport production from various locations to Abuja.

After receiving a detailed briefing from NIS officials and witnessing the production process, Kawu said he was convinced that the reform was aimed at strengthening the integrity and security of Nigeria’s international travel documents while bringing the country’s passport administration in line with international best practices.

He said, “They explained the process to us in detail, what they have achieved so far and what they are currently doing. Their objective is to adopt international best practices.

“From what I witnessed, I salute the courage of the Comptroller-General, the Minister and, of course, the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, President Bola Ahmed Asiwaju Tinubu.”

Kawu said the centralised system represented a decisive departure from a regime that had allegedly been associated with delays, corruption, suspicion and other irregularities.

“I believe they are doing something that will enable us to migrate from the old system, which was surrounded by suspicion, corruption, delays and many other challenges, to a more transparent and result-oriented system,” he said.

The senator stressed that passport production was too sensitive to be left vulnerable to manipulation, particularly in view of Nigeria’s security challenges, porous borders and the growing sophistication of criminal networks.

“For our national security, we need to have a centralised system that will produce our passports. The passport is one of the most important documents for any Nigerian,” he said.

He added that greater central control over the production process would make it more difficult for criminal elements to compromise the integrity of Nigerian passports.

“We need to protect the integrity of our passport because it is not just an ordinary document. It identifies you as a Nigerian and gives you the right to travel internationally,” Kawu said.

He said the Senate delegation had gone to the Immigration headquarters specifically to verify complaints reaching lawmakers from Nigerians, particularly in Kano and other northern states, rather than relying on hearsay.

The of the Senate delegation said, “Our constituents insisted that we must come here, witness the process myself and return to tell my constituents that there is no cause for alarm.

“I am 100 per cent satisfied with the explanation given to us and what we have seen here. We will solidly support the Nigeria Immigration Service.”

Kawu promised to take the findings of the delegation back to the Senate, saying Nigerians needed to be properly informed about the reform to prevent misinformation from undermining a potentially important security and administrative initiative.

He said, “What we have seen today is different from what some people thought was happening. The passport centres have not been closed. What has changed is where the physical production is taking place.”

The NIS, in its presentation to the lawmakers, said the centralisation of passport production was introduced following a comprehensive assessment of the existing system and was designed primarily to strengthen national security, eliminate extortion, improve accountability and create a uniform production process.

The Assistant Comptroller-General in charge of Passports and Other Travel Documents, Titilayo Olaiya, said the reform began in 2024 after the Service identified significant weaknesses in the decentralised production arrangement.

‘It started in 2024 when we assessed what we had on ground. We realised that the main purpose of the reform was to enhance national security,” Olaiya said.

According to him, the NIS subsequently developed a centralised workflow through which the Service could monitor the entire production process and apply uniform standards across the country.

“What we needed to do was come up with centralised production so that the work could be monitored and we could adopt best practices,” he said.

Olaiya said the new system would significantly reduce opportunities for touts and corrupt intermediaries to exploit applicants desperate to obtain their passports.

Olaiya said, “In the past, when you got to passport offices, a tout could approach you and say that if you wanted to expedite your passport, you should bring a certain amount of money. That is no longer the case,” he said.

“Once an application is submitted, you will notice that it drops into the central production system.

“You don’t need to see anybody and you don’t need to call anybody to expedite the process.”

He explained that the removal of physical intervention in the production stage would make it more difficult for individuals to manipulate the process or demand money from applicants.

“The idea is that once your application has been approved, nobody should be able to hold on to it or ask you for money before it is produced,” Olaiya said.

He disclosed that the central production facility currently had the capacity to produce approximately 1,000 passports every hour, saying the capacity was sufficient to meet the requirements of passport offices across the country.

“The capacity of the machines we currently have on the ground is about 1,000 passports in one hour. So, we have the capacity to supply all the branches with produced passports,” he said.

Olaiya explained that the migration from decentralised production to the central facility was being implemented in phases to avoid disruption, with locations with lower production volumes moved first before larger and busier centres.

He said Kano was included in Phase Four, while major centres in Lagos, including the Ikoyi passport office, were scheduled for a later phase because of their significantly higher production volumes.

He dismissed suggestions that the migration was targeted at Northern Nigeria, describing such claims as a misconception arising from the phased approach.

“That is a misconception caused by the delay and by information circulating about Ikoyi and Festac being part of Phase Five,” he said.

“The reason they fall under Phase Five is because of the volume of production. We started from locations with lower production volumes and moved towards the larger production centres.”

Olaiya stressed that the migration of passport production to Abuja did not mean the closure, relocation or withdrawal of passport services from Kano or any other part of the country.

He said, “All our passport centres are still functioning.

“From application submission to biometrics, all those processes are still done at the passport centres.”

He explained that applicants would continue to visit passport centres to submit applications, undergo biometric enrolment and complete other necessary processes, after which approved applications would be transmitted electronically to the central production facility.

“Immediately a person is enrolled, and his/her application approved, the application is sent automatically into production.

“We are not wasting time on that. All the bottlenecks have been removed.”

According to him, after production, passports are dispatched through courier services either to the relevant passport office or directly to the applicant’s address, depending on the delivery option selected.

The NIS official said the new process would therefore enable applicants to complete the necessary physical procedures at passport centres without having to travel to Abuja merely because the document was physically produced there.

Earlier, the Deputy Comptroller-General in charge of Visa and Residency, Dr Franca Nwanneka, who received the Senate delegation on behalf of the Comptroller-General, Kemi Nanna Nandap, said the NIS recognised the importance of ensuring that Nigerians understood the reasons behind the changes.

“We have a new regime and we have automated a lot of our processes. We are also carrying out sensitisation,” Nwanneka said.

She acknowledged that resistance and confusion were natural consequences of changing a system that Nigerians had used for many years.

“Every change is difficult to implement because when people are used to a particular way of doing things and a change comes, it is difficult for them to grasp and imbibe it immediately,” she said.

Nwanneka urged members of the National Assembly, traditional institutions, community leaders and other stakeholders to help the NIS communicate the changes effectively to Nigerians, particularly those at the grassroots.

She said the Service had already commenced sensitisation campaigns in English, Pidgin and Hausa to ensure that applicants were adequately informed and protected from misinformation and exploitation.

The DCG said the Service was particularly concerned about ensuring that applicants understood that the centralisation of production was not synonymous with the closure of passport offices.

“The centres are still there. Nigerians should continue to go to their passport centres for enrolment and biometric capture. What we have centralised is the production itself,” she explained.

Nwanneka disclosed that the remaining major migration exercise would involve Lagos and some Nigerian diplomatic missions abroad, including locations in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, before the end of the year.

She said the phased approach was necessary to ensure that the system could absorb the workload without creating new bottlenecks.

The Senate delegation also raised concerns over complaints from Nigerians in Saudi Arabia about difficulties associated with passport applications and renewals.

Kawu urged the Immigration Service to strengthen its communication and intervention mechanisms for Nigerians living abroad, saying citizens outside the country should not be left stranded because of administrative challenges.

In response, the NIS explained that it operates from the Nigerian Consulate in Jeddah and periodically conducts passport intervention exercises at the Nigerian Embassy in Riyadh.

The Service said Immigration Attachés were also available to assist Nigerians experiencing difficulties with passport applications and related documentation.

The NIS officials assured the delegation that the centralisation programme was not designed to take passport services away from Nigerians but to modernise the production process, strengthen security, eliminate opportunities for extortion and create a more transparent system in which applicants could track their applications without relying on intermediaries.

For Kawu, the reform, if properly implemented and communicated, could represent a significant turning point in Nigeria’s passport administration.

He said the Senate would support measures that improved national security and reduced the burden on Nigerians, while also ensuring that the Immigration Service remained responsive to legitimate complaints from citizens.

“The objective should be to make things easier for Nigerians, not more difficult,” he said.

“If this system will eliminate corruption, delays and extortion while protecting the integrity of our passports, then it is a reform that deserves the support of Nigerians,” he added.