The Comptroller General of the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS), Mohammad Babandede, has said that no fewer than 27,046 migrants have been registered in the e-migrant registration database since its inception in July.
Babandede disclosed this in Benin on Thursday in his remarks at the opening ceremony of the Comptroller General of Immigration annual conference.
He disclosed that of the figure, 17,875 were irregular migrants representing 66 per cent of the total number of migrants registered, adding that 9,170 representing 34 per cent were regular migrants.
He explained that the objective of the migrants’ e-registration was to afford the Nigerian Government the opportunity to know precisely the total number of migrants’ residents in the country as well as their status.
Babandede also said that the migrants data would also assist the government in sociopolitical and National Demographic growth plans.
He further disclosed that the NIS had also reviewed the Nigerian Immigration Service manual of 1963 and published the support from International Office for Migration (IOM) and funding from the Netherland, Switzerland and GIZ Germany.
The CG also said that it was during the annual conference in 2017, in Ogun State, that the strategic action plans for the passport reforms were initiated.
He noted that President Mohammadu Buhari had on Jan. 15, launched the new e-passport booklet, which have feature like polycarbonate bio-data page technology.
“This enhances security features in line with International Civil Aviation Authority (ICAO) requirements and guidelines for electronic machine readable travel document.
