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The government of Seychelles has explained why it introduced visa restrictions measures against Nigerians seeking to travel to the West Indian country.
According to authorities, the far-reaching border control policy became necessary due to a recent increase in drug trafficking and fraudulent activities by Nigerian passport holders in Seychelles.
The country's Vice President, Ahmed Afif, who confirmed the development to reporters, said immigration authorities had been instructed to grant Nigerians with diplomatic passports, valid work or resident permits access into the island nation.
However, citizens of the West African country seeking to enter Seychelles as tourists or new immigrants have been slammed with an indefinite ban, Seychelles News Agency (SNA) quoted Afif as saying.
The Vice President added that his country will keep a close track of other categories of travellers and Seychelles Electronic Border System (SEBS) will scrutinise such applications to find out their reasons for wanting to come into the country.
He said his government has observed, in the past few months, a tendency deemed as dangerous for its border integrity and economy, due to criminal activities happening in the country.
“We have seen a clear link between this with certain people from Nigeria. In the past two weeks, for example, 13 people coming from Nigeria have been arrested when entering Seychelles because they were carrying drugs into the country,” Afif said per SNA.
“In one case, 62 Nigerians who said they were on holiday used false credit cards and the money was never credited to the accounts of these establishments.”
“These establishments have lost money. These people spent free holidays in the country at the expense of the establishment owners, and there is nothing that can be done for them,” he added.
This development comes amid controversy on social media after some Nigerian applicants claimed to have been denied visas by Seychelles without any tenable reason.
In recent months, Nigerians have been targeted for visa ban by some countries, including the United Arab Emirates, which added the West African nation to its list of banned 17 African countries.
Though he said Seychelles doesn't fundamentally have any issues with Nigeria and Nigerians, Afif insisted that his country was deeply concerned and needed to respond to the recent spike in criminal activities linked to Nigerians.
“We do not have a problem with Nigeria or its people though we do not tolerate such criminal activities in our country.
“There are other online scams originating from Nigeria. We have seen that these people are also coming to Seychelles and doing those scams,” he said.