The Minister of Interior, Hon. Dr. Olubunmi Tunji- Ojo has unveiled a scorecard which many Nigerians have commended as impressive and heartwarming.
He made the disclosure while interacting with media practitioners at the 2025 first quarter media parley which held at Chelsea Hotel on Tuesday.
Some of the highlights of the scorecard include the 50 per cent increase in inmates feeding allowance from N750 to N1125; 35% female recruitment policy; clearing of over 200,000 backlog of passport requests in less than three weeks; electronic- border solution; rehabilitation of many correctional facilities across the country as well as barracks for the personnel.This list is far from being exhaustive.
“We reinforced our commitment to gender balance and equality in 2024 by ensuring that at least 35% of new recruits across all services under our supervision were women,” the Minister said.
He also announced that the Ministry made over N6bn in revenue the bulk of which came from marriage services N2.4bn and expatriate quota N3.2bn. Other sources were Citizenship N392m and places of worship N12.5m.
Explaining how the over 150% increase in revenue compared to the previous year was achieved, the Minister said inter alia,
“So we decided to automate the whole process and optimize the solution. And in the last one year, I’m happy to tell you that the revenue that accrued to government increased by over 150% due to the optimization of that particular solution.”
“I’m happy to tell you that the first phase of our e-border solution has been completed as we speak. I wouldn’t want to go too deeply into that, but I want to tell you that the first phase is 100% completed and covers 40% of the design of the e-border solution across the country,” he added.
He also cited the e-gate solution at the airports as part of the country’s border control plan. “If you are in Nigeria, the e-gate is up and running in Abuja, fully integrated and installed in Lagos”, Tunji- Ojo said.
He said Nigeria had also adopted Advance Passenger Information (API) and Passenger Name Record (PNR) to streamline traveller identification management and facilitate border management.
The Minister also gave a peep into what to expect for 2025 among which is the visa unification policy which will go into full effect this year. As part of measures to continue to make passport processing and issuance faster with little or no stress, he said that a number of contactless centers were being established to enhance is operation. The second phase of the e- border solution is also to be deployed this year, according to the Minister.
A few reactions from Nigerians are sampled below.
A group who identified themselves as Friends of Prisoners hailed the increase in inmate’s feeding allowance as a move in the right direction while appealing for further increase in the new year in view of the high cost of food as well as other goods and services in the country.
Two jubilant female staff of the Federal Fire Service testified, on condition of anonymity, that they are new recruits adding that they believed that the 35% female inclusion in recruitment may have paved the way for their employment.
Dele Omoniyi, a journalist says, “who could have believed that in Nigeria a backlog of over 200000 passport applications can be cleared in less than 3 weeks? He continues, “not just that, the new speed of issuance has been sustained over the past few months. Also corrupt practices around passport issuance are gradually becoming a thing of the past.”