On Friday, the Minister inspected the new electronic gates at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport’s terminal in Abuja. During the inspection, he addressed the delay in implementing the home delivery service for passports, attributing it to the absence of dedicated data centres.
The Minister explained that the home delivery service for Nigerians in the diaspora will initially be launched in the United States and the United Kingdom, following preliminary testing to ensure its effectiveness.
He stated, “We have completed the entire solution, but upon taking office, we discovered the lack of a dedicated data centre. We were relying on a private company’s data centre, and while we are grateful for their assistance, we believe it’s crucial to establish a permanent solution rather than relying on quick fixes.
“We could have launched the service in February, but building our own data centre from scratch was necessary to maintain the integrity of our data and national security. It is unacceptable for NIS, at 61 years old, to not have control over the biometric data of Nigeria. As the custodian of this data, NIS should be in charge, not a third party. This is why we prioritized creating our own data centre,” he emphasized.