KEMI OMONIYI
The House of Representatives Committee on Diaspora has reiterated its readiness to re-introduce and quicken passage into law, diaspora voting bill, rejected during the constitution amendment excercise by the National Assembly Joint Committee on review of 1999 Constitution.
Chairman of the Committee, Rep Tolulope Akande-Shadipe, stated this when the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, (CEO) of Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, (NIDCOM) Dr Abike Dabiri-Erewa, appeared before the Committee, in defence of the commission’s 2023 budget.
Akande-Shadipe posited that the rejected bill will eventually be passed, because that is the direction the entire world is going.
“We would be back with the bill. They are Nigerians and they have the right to vote in Nigeria elections. The modalities and issues raised the last time would be resolved, and we would come back to it
“Many citizens of Nigeria are leaving the country and the Nigeria Immigration Service is complicit in this issue of illegal migration. Once the immigration authorities are complicit, we are only making notice.”
The lawmaker further revealed that the Committee is also looking at the issue of people of Nigerian descent who currently are not Nigerians but want to return home after DNA tests conducted by the authorities had proven that they have ties with Nigeria.
At the presentation, Chairman and CEO of NIDCOM Dr Dabiri-Erewa, urged Nigerians to stop migrating to other countries if they don’t have jobs there.
According to her, eighty percent of prisoners in Dubai are Nigerians, who went there without waiting jobs, and sooner than later, got into trouble.
Abike Dabiri, a former lawmaker stressed the need for a stronger multi-sector collaboration between Nigeria Immigration Service, (NIS); National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, (NAPTIP) and other agencies to stop the trend.
She added that the Nigerian authorities need to put their house in order, to atop citizen of the country from moving out to other countries in large number.
