The Presidential Taskforce (PTF) on COVID-19 said on Thursday in Abuja that since it inaugurated the International Travel Portal about four weeks ago, over 27,000 passengers have entered into the country through the Lagos and Abuja airports.
Coordinator of the PTF on COVID-19 Dr Sani Aliyu, who spoke at an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), explained that it was a huge operation, with 18,000 coming through Lagos and just a little over 9,000 through Abuja.
“Of the 27,000 plus passengers, 99.8 per cent had a negative COVID-19 Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test result. The majority, specifically 85 per cent, had no issues with payment on the portal. Of the 15 per cent who had issues, 12 per cent had their issues resolved on arrival.
“It is correct to say that of the 27,000, the majority seamlessly went through the registration, entry, and re-testing process.
“However, with an operation of this scope and scale, there are bound to be issues that will arise; this is an IT system. It’s not perfect; we are humans, talk less of computers,” he explained.
Aliyu said the Travel Portal was still relatively new.
“We didn’t try out the portal but we immediately implemented it because of the pressure for reopening the international airports. Without the travel portal, we would still be struggling to reopen airports safely,” he said. (Nation)