People carrying a Nigerian passport can freely access only 46 out of 227 travel destinations, without a prior visa. This figure has remained so since 2019, the 2023 Henley Passport Index revealed.
The index assesses and evaluates the value of the passports of 199 countries on the global mobility spectrum. It ranks countries’ passports to determine the destinations their holders can access without a visa.
The top five countries that have significantly increased their visa-free access into numerous countries are Singapore which ranks 1st with access to 192 destinations, together with its counterparts; Germany, Italy, Spain, and Austria.
The least countries are Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Pakistan with visa-free scores of 27, 29, 30 and 33 destinations, respectively.
The index recorded the growth for countries like the United Arab Emirates in Asia which moved from a 35 access score in 2006 to 179 in 2023.
Likewise in Africa, Seychelles and Mauritius have increased their visa-free access from 52 countries each in 2006 to 155 and 148 in 2023.
On the contrary, Nigeria did not record any significant growth between those years but has staggeringly moved between low figures of 35, 40 and 50 respectively. Infact, the highest the country has ever attained is 51 which was in 2010 while its lowest was recorded in 2006 with a score points of 35. With such a trend, Nigeria has only maintained an average of 45.6.
A Dataphyte report stated the 46 countries that Nigerians can access, which include 8 countries in Oceania, including Fiji, Palau Island, and Cook Island. Two countries in the Middle East; Iran and Lebanon.
READ ALSO: Nigeria Ranks 100th out of 112 Globally on Visa-Free Index
Others are five countries in the Caribbean including Dominica, Haiti, and Montserrat, three Asian countries and 28 African countries.
In Africa, Nigeria ranked 29th with South Sudan while Seychelles and Mauritius top the list ranking 1st and 2nd respectively.
Ironically, Nigeria, the giant of Africa, was not among the top 10 countries with the highest score in Africa but was rather listed among the bottom ten with the worst passport quality in the region.
In the West Africa region, Nigeria is last on the list with The Gambia scoring the highest.
Passport strength is not a nominal value, rather, there are a number of parameters that justify the formidableness of a country’s passport ranging from political, demographic and socio-economic variables.
What determines a country’s passport strength?
There are different factors that bolster a country’s passport but just two important predictors and their variants will be discussed in this report.
Level of Income
While there are few outliers, the value of a country’s economy is a relevant metric for measuring the quality and power of a country’s passport and the number of destinations its holders can access without a prior visa. The level of Income of a country is generally ascertained through GDP growth.
Gross domestic product (GDP) is the aggregate monetary or market value of all finished products and services processed and produced within a national boundary at a given time.
Countries are likely to freely open their borders to citizens from wealthier nations because of chances of investments and other economic dividends.
Also, citizens from high-income countries have less tendency to overstay or engage in illegal migration, a trend that is common among citizens of low-income and underdeveloped countries whose motive for the travel might be to flee violence and poverty in their home country.
Unauthorized migration disrupts the host country’s social and economic growth. This realization has made these countries to be more proactive with their immigration laws and policies, shielding themselves from unnecessary burdens.
The trend from 2006 to 2020 shows that citizens from high-income and upper-middle-income countries gain substantial access to destinations across the world compared to citizens in low and lower-middle-income countries.
In a report by Henley and Partners, Dr Omer and Ugur Altundal stated that there are some exceptions as regards income being a potent determinant of passport strength. For instance, countries that have increased their visa-free destinations the most are not necessarily the wealthiest nations.
Some of the countries with the highest increases are mostly middle-income countries in Eastern Europe (such as Romania and Ukraine), the Americas (such as Colombia and Peru) and East Africa( such as Mauritius).
Despite these exceptions, income level still remains a powerful metric in the growth of passport value. The fact that the top 5 countries with the highest visa access in the 2023 index are all from the high-income group validates income as the topmost criterion.
Political Stability
In the 2023 Global Peace Index (GPI), Mauritius was ranked 23 with a level of peace that is “high” making it the most peaceful country in Africa.
Nigeria has a level of peace that is “low.” This is expected as it ranks among the 10 most highly terrorized countries in the world in the Global Terrorism Index.
Political instability, violence, restiveness and all forms of conflict generally deteriorate a country’s peace and usually impact the economy of the concerned country and its outlook in the international terrain.
The GPI report stressed that the global economic impact of violence was $17.7 trillion in 2022 compared to $16.5 trillion in the previous year(about 12.9% of the world’s GDP), or $2,200 per person.
In 2021, the economic impact of Armed Conflict surged by 27% to $559.3 billion. The increase resulted from the rise in the number of refugees and displaced persons from terrorist attacks and conflicts. This is rife in countries that have a high presence of terrorism, including Nigeria.
The economic impact of violence/armed conflict as the case may be is the total expenditure a country expended in containing the consequences of violence. In a more peaceful climate, the amount spent in dealing with violence could have been diverted into a more rewarding project that will potentially improve the value of the economy of such a country.
Violence usually takes a toll on the health of a nation’s economy either in the form of physical loss, property damage, loss of lives, displacement and increased military spending.
Afghanistan has a “very low” level of peace. This makes it a high-risk country to visit by citizens of other countries. Its citizens are also at high risk to accommodate in other countries, putting a stain on its international reputation.
This may have impacted its least ranking on the Henley Passport Index with just 27 score points which translates to its holders having access to visit only 27 countries out of 227 without a prior visa.
In essence, no economy would want to give unrestricted access to a politically destabilized county or its citizens because of the economic implication such access could incur on their overall growth.
Get real time update about this post categories directly on your device, subscribe now.
