Some trafficking syndicates attempting to obtain international passport for girls with the purpose of taking them out of Nigeria for illicit activities have been apprehended.
They were caught by officers of the Nigeria Immigration Service, NIS, at the newly created Alimosho Passport Front Office in Lagos.
The Passport Control Officer (PCO), Mrs Ayoola Malaolu who confirmed the incident and the subsequent arrest of the latest suspected traffickers, lamented that trafficking syndicates are not relenting in their crooked means and methods to traffic people out of Nigeria.
Malaolu, noted that trafficking in persons especially criminal recruitment and sponsorship of unsuspecting young girls and even sometimes male and female adults to foreign countries for financial exploitation in disguise of education, work and better life, is one of such illicit trades that has continued to boom in Nigeria.
According to her, “Apart from some human trafficking syndicates recently apprehended at the newly-established Alimosho Passport Front Office in Lagos, some others have been caught too. For instance, the NIS officers, few weeks ago, successfully burst the plan by a suspected human trafficking ring to take two underage girls out of the country.
“The alleged trafficker – a woman- had taken the girls to the passport office claiming they were her daughters, who needed the international passports to travel out of Nigeria.
“But the eagle-eyed immigration officers detected that the woman’s age gap and the ages of the two girls did not match her claim that she gave birth to the teenage girls. On further investigation, the suspect admitted that the girls were recruited for trafficking abroad, for commercial exploitation,” Malaolu said.
Meanwhile, it was gathered that many suspected human traffickers had been apprehended at the Alimoso Passport Front Office since it commenced operation on January 30, 2023.
According to the sources, the traffickers might have wrongly assumed that they could have their way easily because the front office was new.
“We have had instances where people wanted to procure passports for adopted children for the purpose of taking them overseas. Those who have legal documents of adoption were directed to Abuja because only the CGI (Comptroller General of Immigration) has the final say on such issues,” a senior officer said.
The officer added, “For those who did illegal adoptions, they came posing that the babies were their biological kids but were uncovered by our diligent officers. When certain documents were required from them, some of them didn’t come back.”
