The Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) has suspended the collection of $90 biometric Visa-On- Arrival policy it introduced about two weeks ago.
Investigations also revealed that the service was not in charge of collection of charges at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos as that aspect has been concessioned out to private firms.
More Investigations on Tuesday revealed that the biometric, which came on stream on June 12, was only implemented for two days, but was later suspended following complaints from some of the travelers who claimed that there were no enough awareness on the new policy.
A report had said on Monday that the command introduced the $90 biometric visa on arrival and additional $20 as processes for foreigners who were entering the country despite the fact that they had already paid for visas from their respective countries.
The report also claimed that the introduction of the charges caused chaos at the terminal as some of the passengers delayed on arrival at the airport.
But, a source close to the command explained that some of the services initially handled by the service had been concessioned out to private firms.
For instance, it was gathered that the biometric Visa-On Arrival charges was being handled by Online Integrated Service (OIS) while the process charges is handled by New Works.
However, it was gathered that the biometric charges was supposed to be a reciprocity as some countries around the world was already charging the citizens of Nigeria who travel into their countries.
Some the countries with biometric charges on Nigerian travelers according to investigations are United Kingdom, United States of America, South Africa, Kenya and China among others.
The source said: “Our officers at the Lagos Airport don’t collect any charges from any traveller. The only thing our officers do at the airport is just to profile passports of travellers and ensure that those without concrete missions do not enter our country.
“It is true that we commenced the collection of biometric charges for travellers, but the policy was suspended within two days because of inadequate publicities. But, we are not reinventing the wheels because this thing is reciprocity. Some of these countries charge our citizens the same amount of money we intend to charge them.”
Meanwhile, when contacted, Mr. Dikko Yashe, the Comproller of Immigration at the Lagos Airport, declined to comment on the issue.
