UAE Lifts Visa Embargo On Nigerians As Emirates Permitted to Resume Operation in Nigeria

Posted by African Examiner African News, Featured, Latest Headlines, News, News Across Nigeria, News From The State Wednesday, September 30th, 2020

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – The Federal Government announced that the United Arab Emirates has agreed to resume visa issuance to Nigerians

Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, made the announcement Wednesday via his Twitter handle.

In addition, UAE, the Minister disclosed has permitted the operation of Emirates Airlines in Nigeria.

Sirika tweets read: “UAE has written to state that they agree to issue visas to Nigerians, consequently a decision has been reached to allow Emirates to fly into Nigeria.

“Commencement of the Visa issuance is condition precedent. Please bear with this unusual situation. Many thanks.”

Recall that the FG had banned Emirates Airlines from Lagos and Abuja airports over alleged refusal to grant fresh visa applications submitted by Nigerians.

Before the resumption of international flights in the country, the announced that airlines such as: Air France, KLM, Etihad, RwandAir, Air Namibia, Royal Air Maroc, Lufthansa, TAAG Angola and few others were not granted approval to commence flight operations.

Earlier, UAE claimed that travel between the UAE and Nigeria was limited due to the closure of the Nigerian airspace.

The country also denied restricting the issuance of visa to Nigerian visitors, claiming that from the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the UAE took a number of precautionary measures to combat the virus’ spread, including the temporary suspension on issuing UAE visas to all nationalities as of March 17, 2020.