- Nigeria, Brazil hold talks, initiate direct flight operations
- Delta, United, Emirates get exemption to sell tickets in dollars
- Delta to increase capacity, begins NY-Lagos route Dec
- NAMA' s move to complete Surface Movement Radar for Lagos, Abuja airports 'll curb airside, ground incidents, others
- African airlines demand up by 10.1% in Aug
NIS records sharp drop in visa on arrival over COVID-19
- 800 trapped Nigerians in Libya return
The Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) has disclosed that the country recorded drastic reduction in the issuance of visa on arrival at many of the country’s international airport as a result of Coronavirus currently ravaging the globe.
A top official of NIS at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos disclosed that a total of 265 on arrival visas were issued in February as against 440 in January by NIS at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport with a decline of 175
This shows the implication of COVID-19 to business investors to Nigerian or ease of doing business in the country
But both the Port Health and immigration personnel have been working assiduously to ensure effective coverage especially in the area of Yello Fever card
It was also learnt that the earlier agitation between passengers and immigration personnel in the wake of the Coronavirus has stopped as passengers now surrender their documents for check
On protection of officers against COVID-19, the source said, “We are provided with sanitisers and face mask everyday, it has become a consumable, we change it on and on and port health always give us advice on how to use them, so we have become port health officers in disguise”
“Our embarkation form, the information there are very reliable and that is the bulk of the data for the passengers, on passenger manifest, so these are the raw data that give us a trace to the passenger in line and it is really helpful” added the source
Meanwhile, about 800 returnees from Libya arrived the country through the Murtala Mohammed International Airport between January and February 2020.
Among the 800 were those found wanting, deportees, voluntarily returnees and repatriation.
More on the list of the returnees were voluntarily returnees, those who have found out that they can no accept the horrible conditions in country.
It was also gathered that deportees were very negligible and repatriations were a little bit higher than deportation while the voluntary topped the list.
According to sources close to the immigration service at the airport, all the returnees were treated Ike normal passengers, profiled without stigmatisation .
|
|
