The Comptroller General of the Nigeria Immigration Service, Muhammad Babandede, has retired after 36 years in service. Babandede served as CG of NIS for five years and four months. The Deputy Comptroller- General, Finance and Account, Idris Jere, has stepped in as acting CG depending the appointment of a substantive CG by the President Muhammadu Buhari. Babandede, who was appointed as CG on May 15, 2016, succeeded Martin Abeshi. He enacted several reforms in the service, notably the digitisation of passport operations and the introduction of paperless administration. Babandede also decentralized the issuance of passports and introduced the much-acclaimed Visa- on-Arrival policy. Addressing officers and men of the NIS during a valedictory session organised in his honour on yesterday, Babandede said: “I have left Immigration better than I found it.” He acknowledged that he could only achieve so much with the assistance of his fellow officers. He appealed to anyone who will succeed him not to “throw away the ideas we stand for”. “Keep the good things and drop the bad ones,” he said.
