The Nigeria Immigration Service, NIS has uncovered an illegal office in Idumagbo area of Lagos, where some of its officials connived with civilians to register foreigners. Consequently, two of its officials and five civilian accomplices have been arrested.
Vanguard gathered that their modus operandi included visiting companies in Lagos owned by foreigners, pretending to have been sent from the NIS office at Alagbon, to register members of staff. They were alleged to have collected N60,000 and above from each registered foreigner but that the money was not remitted into government’s account.
Following complaints of irregularities in the documentation of some of these foreigners, among who are Lebanese, Chinese and Indians, the NIS reportedly carried out raids in some areas in the state, where the illegal registration office was located. Sources at Nigeria Immigration Service explained that “The officials are presently detained at the Immigration office, Alagbon Close, Ikoyi. They were intercepted in two different raids by the operations unit of the service.
“It is so sad to discover that our own men are involved in the sabotaged registration of foreigners. One of our officials and three of his civilian accomplices were first arrested in Idumagbo area of Lagos Island. Another official was arrested with two others last week.
When they visit these companies, they would tell them that they were from the Headquarters and that they came to do them a favour by coming to register them, considering how they (foreigners) were. The companies will be happy to entertain them and pay as from N60,000 for each of their staff.
“They opened a secret office at Idumagbo, where foreigners from Niger, Togo, Chad, Cameroon, were registered. Some files containing so many incriminating documents were recovered in the process. This is too bad because the suspects are sabotaging the government, deceiving foreigners and extorting them, thereby giving us bad names
