A quarter-century-old partnership between Nigeria and the Netherlands reached a new milestone in Abuja this week, as the Dutch government handed over a substantial equipment donation to the Nigeria Immigration Service’s Hostmanship Unit, a program built around reshaping how immigration officers treat the traveling public.
The donation, presented at a ceremony in the capital, was extensive by any measure: a 24 KVA solar inverter system paired with a 20-kilowatt lithium backup battery, two 75-inch LG Smart TVs and mounting equipment, a digital projector with screen, nine sun-shaped window blinds, an outdoor wireless router, four solar standing fans, an integrated sound system with wireless microphones, an HP laptop, and a whiteboard setup. But for Comptroller General of Immigration Kemi Nandap, the value of the gesture went well beyond the hardware itself.
Nandap described the donation as an investment in institutional character rather than simply office equipment, framing it as tangible support for a service-wide effort to make empathy and professionalism defining features of how NIS officers interact with the public. She credited the Hostmanship Unit, despite being a relatively new addition to the service, with already making significant headway in embedding that guest-centered approach through structured training and the development of formal engagement guidelines. The new equipment, she said, would help the unit scale up its training capacity and operate more efficiently going forward. She was particularly warm in her praise of the Repatriation and Departure Service within the Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security, describing the relationship as one built on trust and shared learning rather than one-directional technical assistance, and pledged that the donated items would be properly maintained and put to full use.
The Hostmanship program itself is a joint creation, developed in partnership with the Dutch Repatriation and Departure Service to train Nigerian immigration officers in approaching public interactions with dignity, empathy, and professionalism. Speaking on behalf of the Dutch government, Charge d’Affaires Ronnald Sonnemans said he had personally observed how the training reshaped NIS officers over the years, and reaffirmed the Netherlands’ continued commitment to migration cooperation, including an ongoing mobile team project aimed at professionalizing Nigeria’s border management operations.
That commitment, according to Jan-Willem Keuninck, Senior Adviser at the Netherlands’ Agency of Dominions for Europe, Justice and Security, is rooted in 25 years of sustained collaboration between the two countries, spanning annual municipal visits, a signed migration MOU, and numerous joint training initiatives. He noted that NIS officers have already been certified as Hostmanship trainers in the Netherlands, with a new program for the service’s senior executives set to launch there in September.
For NIS Hostmanship Coordinator ACI Samson Thomas, the ceremony carried symbolic weight beyond its practical benefits. He described the moment as historic, noting that the unit responsible for the initiative did not even exist a little over a year ago, and pledged that it would continue building hostmanship into a lasting institutional value within the service.
