The federal government has said it will mirror the United States’ new visa rules requiring disclosure of social media activity.
On Monday, the US mission in Nigeria announced that applicants must submit usernames or handles across all platforms used in the past five years. The embassy warned that failure to provide such details could result in visa denial and ineligibility for future applications.
Reacting, Kimiebi Ebienfa, spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said Nigeria would reciprocate.
He said the ministry was informed of the decision ahead of the public announcement.
“I think that’s what the government might do because anything visa is reciprocal. What you are mandating our nationals to do, we will also mandate your citizens applying for our visa to do,” Ebienfa said.
He disclosed that the federal government would convene an inter-agency meeting with the Ministry of Interior and the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) to agree on Nigeria’s formal response.
“So, the stakeholders that are involved will have a meeting and agree on our best way to respond to it holistically,” he added.
The US had earlier instructed international student applicants in June to make their social media accounts public for vetting. In May, the Trump administration suspended student visa appointment scheduling as part of tightened restrictions. By July, applicants for F, M, and J non-immigrant visas were directed to set their social media accounts to ‘public’ to allow unrestricted checks.
