PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday kicked off a New Visa Policy, NVP, to increase the nation’s economic prospects by allowing multi-entry visas for Nigerians who renounced their citizenship and permit travellers to obtain a visa upon arrival into the country.

In a Twitter post, President Buhari assured Nigerians that the policy would make the Nigerian economic landscape globally competitive and attract specialised skills from Nigerians in the diaspora.

“Nigeria’s Visa Policy provides an avenue to achieve African integration by the introduction of visas on arrival for short visits to Nigeria for holders of passports of African Union countries,” he said at the official presentation of the NVP at the State House in Abuja.

The new visa policy has increased the classes of visa types from the initial categories of six visa types to 79, visa on arrival for African Union, AU, citizens, creation of visa codes for all classes of visa and introduction of e-visas.

This new Visa Policy will advance our goal of building a globally competitive economy, by helping attract Innovation, and specialized skills and knowledge from abroad, to complement locally available ones. We are sending a message to the world that Nigeria is Open for Business.

— Muhammadu Buhari (@MBuhari) February 4, 2020

Tolu Ogunlesi, special assistant on digital and new media to President Muhammadu Buhari in a thread of tweets hinted on the visa types introduced by the new policy.

“If you’re a Nigerian by birth but have had to give up your citizenship because your new country doesn’t allow dual citizenship (China, Isreal, India etc), you are now eligible to get a multi-year, multiple entry visa that allows you to visit Nigeria easily,” he tweeted.

He also stated that the visa for investors was expanded into five categories, while there are special short visa classes for a single entry visa for purposes of business which depends on the occupation of the applicant.

“Nigeria has now launched an “Investor Visa” Class with 5 categories: N3A, N3B, N3C, N3D, N3E.

“Under the NVP, Nigeria is now able to issue 2 to 5-year multiple entry Visas to citizens of countries that issue such to Nigerians, in line with the principle of reciprocity,” he tweeted.

Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, Minister of Interior, while speaking at the launch of the NVP 2020, said that the new policy was pivotal for investors because it will increase the ease of doing business in the country.

Explaining further, he said the policy allows Nigerians with dual citizenship to use the passports of their adopted countries to visit the country without a short-stay visa.

“The NVP 2020 introduces special visas for Nigerians in the diaspora who either by birth, marriage or nationalisation has assumed dual citizenship.

“Such category of Nigerians will now be able to make use of the passports of their adopted countries to visit Nigeria without the need for a short-stay visa,” he said.