2015 Prsidential election: Federal Government closes land, sea borders

The Federal Government has said all land and sea borders will be closed from midnight on Thursday to midnight on Saturday, to allow for a hitch-free poll.

The Comptroller-General of Immigration Service, David Parradang, who announced this in Abuja on Wednesday, said immigration personnel had been deployed in land borders to ensure that no illegal migrants come into the country during the elections.

A statement by the NIS Public Relations Officer, Emeka Obua, said the CG stated this during a meeting with some embassy officials and leaders of ECOWAS communities from Niger Republic, Senegal, Chad, Cameroun, Guinea and Mali.

Parradang cautioned foreigners resident in Nigeria against coming to vote during the elections, adding that any Non-Nigerian caught voting would be prosecuted for violating the electoral laws and jailed.

He advised the embassy officials and community leaders to ask their nationals to keep off polling centres, noting that the warning had become necessary to ensure that the existing robust relationship among member-states in the sub-region is not undermined by unnecessary meddlesomeness in the internal electoral affairs of other states.

The statement reads, “The CG announced that effective midnight March 26 to midnight March 28, 2015, all land and sea borders across the country would be closed to allow for a hitch-free elections slated for March 28, 2015.

“He also enjoined the community leaders to advise any of their nationals in possession of Nigeria’s Permanent Voter Cards, National Identity Card or Passport to surrender same immediately as anyone caught with any of them shall be brought before the law.”

The CG further stated that the Nigeria Immigration Service would soon embark on biometric registration of all ECOWAS and other African citizens resident in the country to build a reliable database of all non-Nigerians resident in the country.

According to him, a total of 2,066 irregular migrants who were rounded up across the country have been deported.

Meanwhile, the CG has approved the deployment of five Deputy Comptrollers-General and Command-Comptrollers to different parts of the country to monitor the polls.