Pilgrims’ board appeals for early issuance of e-Passport
The Kaduna State Muslim Pilgrims Welfare Board has appealed to the State command of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) for the early issuance of e-Passport booklets to Intending Pilgrims from the State for this year’s Hajj.
The Acting Overseer Kaduna State Muslim Board, Haj. Hannatu Zailani, made the call in a statement issued through the board’s Public Relations Officer, Malam Salisu Anchau, on Tuesday in Kaduna.
Anchau said that she made the call when she paid a courtesy visit to the NIS on April 7.
She said that intending pilgrims usually faced shortage of e-passports every year, which affected the general exercise of Hajj in the State.
Zailani pleaded with the Comptroller to allocate a number of e-passport documents for early issuance to intending pilgrims, saying that this would give the board enough time to evaluate and correct some mistakes in the applicants’ bio-data provided for the hajj registration.
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The Overseer said that with the advancement of technology and globalization, applicants’ documents such as e-passports, National Identification numbers, Bank accounts, Driver’s licenses, Voters Card carry unique data.
“But, some intending pilgrims carelessly provided different names, inconsistent dates of birth; and these discrepancies had made it difficult for the board to comparatively have reliable data of intending pilgrim.
In his response, the Comptroller NIS Kaduna, Mr Odeh Adapoyi said the aim of the command was to serve people better and work together during outbound and in-bound journeys in Hajj operations.
Adapoyi said that as a stakeholder with the board he hoped the cordial relationship would continue.
He also appealed to the board to assist his command in supervising foreigners from neighbouring countries, who used to apply for Nigerian e-passports to tarnish the image of the country.
Adapoyi said his passport officer was ready always to make the issuance of the e-passport seamless for applicants for the Hajj.
