The Minister of Interior, Bunmi Tunji-Ojo, reported on Tuesday that 55,000 out of the 200,000 passport applications backlog have been successfully processed.
He expressed confidence that more would be cleared before the two-week deadline assigned to the Immigration chief.
Once these backlogs are resolved, Nigerians should expect to receive their passports within a two-week timeframe.
He made these remarks during a visit by the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr. Betta Edu, to his office in Abuja.
This information was shared in a statement by the Director of Press at the Ministry of Interior, Afonja Ajibola.
Minister Tunji-Ojo emphasized the importance of not denying Nigerian citizens their passports and stressed the need for efficient passport issuance services.
He assured that steady progress was being made, with 55,000 passports already cleared out of the instructed 200,000 within two weeks.
In her remarks, Minister Edu pledged to provide soft loans to widows of personnel from various security and civil services, including the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, Immigration Service, Nigerian Correctional Service, and Federal Fire Service.
She also committed to empowering inmates in correctional centers through skill acquisition programs.
Furthermore, Minister Edu expanded on her ministry’s mandate, which now covers approximately 16 million Nigerians vulnerable to insecurity and displacement, leading to humanitarian crises.
She expressed readiness to provide soft loans to widows of deceased personnel from security and civil services, as well as implement skill acquisition programs for correctional facility inmates.
Additionally, her ministry will focus on disaster response, especially concerning the Federal Fire Service, and activate the security intelligence role of the NSCDC as part of a joint partnership effort.
