NIGERIANS residing in Qatar have continued to face difficulty acquiring a Nigerian passport as the embassy in Doha does not have the machines to process the travel document, but relies on the passport intervention team in the United Arab Emirates.

This situation has resulted in a backlog of applications and many Nigerians living and working in the country would be unable to renew their work permits and could lose their jobs, have their bank accounts blocked or worse still, face deportation.

In an interview with Doha News on Friday, former Qatar branch President of Nigerians in Diaspora Organisation’s (NIDO-Qatar) Victor Ikoli, stressed that the most pressing issue throughout his four-year tenure in office was the renewal and issuance of Nigerian passports.

“Over 130 passports are yet to be issued, thereby exposing the individuals to job termination and deportation if their residence cards were invalid, and possibly bank account closure among others,” Okoli was quoted as saying.

Speaking further, he expressed disappointment over the delay with procurement of passport machines for the embassy and called on the Nigerian government to quickly intervene in the situation.

Last year, a Town Hall meeting was organised to address the delays with processing passports for Nigerians in Qatar, at a time when there were over 1000 pending applications for renewal and new passports.

The head of Consular at the Nigerian Embassy in Qatar Musa Abubakar said that the embassy had been selected as one of the potential destinations to receive a passport machine as soon as they are procured.

Nigeria’s missions abroad are grossly underfunded and recent disclosure made by the House of Representatives show that for many years, over 70 per cent of country’s foreign missions have received no budgetary allocation

Stressing on the issue of poor funding for diplomat missions, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Geoffrey Onyeama, has said foreign missions were becoming a “terrible embarrassment” for the country at the global stage as small budgetary allocations are affecting their effectiveness in responding to the expansive structure of diplomatic services.