…Immigration Service warns migrants that, non-compliance with e-registration may attract sanctions***
President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday indicated that the exercise, code-named, ‘Ex-Swift Response’, which culminated into a partial closure of Nigeria’s border with Benin Republic, was undertaken, to curb the massive smuggling activities, especially of rice, taking place on that corridor.
The restriction at Seme border followed the joint border security exercise ordered by the government, in a bid towards securing Nigeria’s land and maritime borders.
The exercise was therefore being jointly conducted by the customs, immigration, police and military personnel and coordinated by the Office of the National Security Adviser.
Buhari explained the rationale, during an audience granted his Beninois counterpart, Patrice Talon, on the margins of the Seventh Tokyo International Conference for African Development (TICAD7), in Yokohama, Japan on Wednesday.
Mr Femi Adesina, the President’s spokesman in a statement in Abuja on Wednesday, said President Buhari expressed great concern over the smuggling of rice.
The president said the activities of the smugglers threatened the self-sufficiency already attained due to his administration’s agricultural policies.
“Now that our people in the rural areas are going back to their farms, and the country has saved huge sums of money which would otherwise have been expended on importing rice using our scarce foreign reserves.
“We cannot allow smuggling of the product at such alarming proportions to continue,” he said.
The Nigerian President said the limited closure of the country’s western border was to allow Nigeria’s security forces develop a strategy on how to stem the dangerous trend and its wider ramifications.
Responding to the concerns raised by President Talon on the magnitude of suffering caused by the closure, President Buhari said he had taken note and would reconsider reopening it, in the not too distant future.
He however, disclosed that a meeting with his counterparts from Benin and Niger Republics would soon be called to determine strict and comprehensive measures to curtail the level of smuggling across their borders.
Earlier, President Talon had called on the Nigerian President as a result of the severe impact the closure of the Nigerian border was having on his people.
President Buhari also received in audience, President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa during which issues of common bilateral relations especially, the killings of Nigerians in South Africa, were discussed.
“The matter will be further examined during the Nigerian leader’s official visit to Pretoria in Oct. 2019,’’ Adesina stated.
In the meantime, the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) has warned that non-compliance by migrants, with the Federal Government’s e-registration directive may attract sanctions after 90 days.
Mrs Caroline Ngere, the Deputy Controller of Immigration (DCI), African Affairs of NIS based in Ikoyi, Lagos, stated this on Wednesday in Lagos.
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Ngere who maintained that no migrant was exempted from the exercise, stressed that the government had granted a 90-day amnesty to the migrants starting from July 12.
“The amnesty covers migrants without regular papers that have been residing in the country from the stipulated date,” she said, explaining that part of the objectives of the exercise was to equip the government with ample statistics of migrants in the country for proper planning and budgeting.
“All the captures will enable the Federal Government to earmark funds substantially for social amenities like schools, hospitals, roads, electricity.
“NIS expects all migrants to take advantage of this beneficial gesture from the Federal Government and present themselves for registration,” she said.
Ngere said that although the government was yet to disclose the specific sanction for non-compliance, it would be advisable for migrants to comply with the directive.
“After all, Nigerians are complying with the Federal Government’s directive on compulsory registration with the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC).
“Why will migrants have issues with e- registration?’’ she said.
