Following the visa ban on Nigerians imposed by the United States Government, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has pointed accusing finger at Buhari Presidency and the All Progressives Congress (APC) urging Nigerians to hold them responsible for the negative impacts of the proposed travel sanctions will cause.
The National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbodiyan, in a statement made available to newsmen in Abuja described the sanction as yet another huge misfortune brought by the Buhari Presidency and the APC which have continued to wreck the nation with its compromised handling of security issues, in addition to escalated bloodletting and human rights violation under their watch.
The party lamented that the travel ban would have grave consequences on economic, educational, and healthcare opportunities; hurt family and social ties as well as further put pressure on the nation’s overall national economy.
According to the statement, “more depressing is that the APC and the Buhari Presidency have been reversing diplomatic gains achieved by previous administrations while gradually pitching our nation against other countries of the world with its poor record on security, corruption and human right issues.
“Our party is worried that our nation that, has become a global destination and investment hub under the PDP, is now being pushed back to a pariah status under the incompetent and divisive APC, as reports from other members of the international community, including credible international organisations, have continued to raise concerns on security and human right issues under the Buhari administration.
“Only recently, our nation was rated as the third country with the highest level of terrorism in 2019 after Iran and Afghanistan, in the Global Terrorism Index rating by the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP).
“It is also worrisome that the APC-led administration had failed to take a decisive step to apprehend and prosecute perpetrators of acts of terrorism including the mass killings in Benue, Nasarawa, Bauchi, Taraba, Kogi, Adamawa, Borno, Yobe, Zamfara, Kaduna, Ekiti, Kogi and other parts of the country under the current administration.
“The PDP restates that such failures by the APC had continued to bolster insurgents, bandits and kidnappers to continue to launch deadly attacks on Nigerians.
Moreover, the APC has failed to account for hoodlums and political mercenaries it imported from neighbouring countries to assist in unleashing violence on Nigerians during the heavily rigged 2019 general elections.”
The PDP, therefore, urged the National Assembly not to relent in its efforts to take decisive action on security, as the travel ban is a wake-up call on our leaders and all critical stakeholders to address the issues at stake.
The party, however, called on the United States to “ensure that the ban does not hurt innocent Nigerians who are also bearing the brunt of the poor handling of security in our country under the APC administration.”
FG reacts to US visa ban, sets up committee
A committee chaired by the Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, to study the reason why the United State banned Nigerians from its immigration visa has been constituted by President Muhammadu Buhari.
The committee is expected to work with the US Government, INTERPOL and other stakeholders to ensure all updates are properly implemented.
According to a statement by the President’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina, in Abuja, the President charged the committee to look at the real reason President Donald Trump banned Nigerians from US immigration visa.
He reiterated the commitment of Nigeria towards maintaining productive relations with the United States and its international allies especially on matters of global security.
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Jan. 31 announced temporary travel restrictions on six countries including Nigeria.
For Nigeria, the restriction is the suspension of the issuance of “immigrant visas” to Nigerian passport holders only.
This suspension shall come into effect on Feb 21.
The suspension does not apply to other U.S visas such as those for official, business, tourism and student travel.
According to the DHS, the suspension of “immigrant visas” became necessary following a review and update of the methodology adopted by the US Government to assess compliance of certain security criteria by foreign governments.
It stated that this resulted in certain enhancements on how information is shared between Nigeria and the US.
