Nigerians with fake test results triggered Omicron travel ban
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Two months before Nigeria’s Omicron embarrassment became global last week, Oyewale Tomori, a distinguished professor of virology, had alerted that Nigerians with fake Covid test results were testing positive on arrival abroad.
“It has to be people from outside who are discovering this and this brings a lot of shame to the country; we lose respect and we lose credibility,” he said.
Tomori is a former Regional Virologist for the World Health Organisation (WHO) Africa Region from 1994 to 2004, who also served as pioneer Vice Chancellor of Redeemer’s University, Ede, Osun State between 2005 and 2011.
In September this year, he was appointed a member of WHO technical advisory group on COVID-19 vaccine composition.
Tomori warned in October that Nigerians who falsify coronavirus results are bringing “shame” to Nigeria and sought better and faster testing to curb the forgery.
President Muhammadu Buhari did not take the warning seriously and failed to act on it, burying his head in the sand like the ostrich – as usual.
But he did not have anywhere to hide his incompetence and negligence on December 4 when the United Kingdom added Nigeria to other nine African countries on its list of Omicron travel ban, three days after Canada fired the first salvo at them.
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The UK added Nigeria to the red list after the discovery of Omicron cases in the UK linked to Africa’s most populous country.
“The government has decided to add Nigeria to the travel red list and that will be effective from 4am on Monday.
“This will mean that only UK residents or citizens of the UK can enter the UK from Nigeria from that point onwards, and they would have to quarantine in one of the relevant hotels,” UK Health Secretary Sajid Javid said on December 4.
Other African countries on the red list are Botswana, Egypt, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe.
Buhari’s Information Minister and propaganda henchman, Lai Mohammed, held a press conference in Abuja on Monday where he ignored the scientific evidence and cited racism. The way he had denied the massacre at Lekki toll gate in October 2020.
Some of the other African countries also allege racism as the motive for the travel ban.
However, Tomori insisted at the Covid summit in Abuja the same Monday that in contrast to the accusation of racism against Canada and the UK, Nigeria is simply paying for its negligence.
“We painfully call the reactions of the UK and Canada racism, inequity. But I say we are paying for condoning our errors of commission and overlooking our errors of omission,” he said.
Forgery in Nigeria exposed overseas
Tomori announced in October that many Nigerians who travelled in the previous five months tested positive for Covid-19 on arrival at their destinations abroad.
He said most of them had tested “negative’’ before leaving Nigeria.
He insisted that the high number of positive results recorded by international health authorities shows that some Nigerians falsify coronavirus test results, per TheCable.
“The report we got from the ports of entry in the last four to five months is that some of the travellers who left Nigeria with negative COVID-19 test results tested positive on arrival in countries including the UK, Ghana and Mali,” Tomori stressed.
“There are two ways to look at it; one, it is either they left the country with fake results or it is still possible that they could have been negative a day or two before leaving the country.
“However, that large number of positives on arrival at international points of entry gives the impression that many of them left Nigeria with forged results.”
Tomori said those who falsify Covid-19 results are bringing “shame” to the country and worsening the spread of the virus. He called for better equipment and increased testing to curb the issuance of false results.
“With the consistent large number, my fear is that they are sending out a lot of people with forged results.
“It is becoming known that some Nigerians, who don’t get tested, are presenting forged negative test results, which is a shame because we don’t have a system in the country to check this.
“It has to be people from outside who are discovering this and this brings a lot of shame to the country; we lose respect and we lose credibility.”
CDC threatens to prosecute travellers with fake Covid test results
Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) Director General Chikwe Ihekweazu announced in May that travellers found with fake coronavirus test results would be arrested and prosecuted.
He said a verification platform had been launched to confirm results.
That came after an investigation by TheCable exposed how travellers paid health officials to obtain fake coronavirus test certificates showing positive diagnosis.
Following the report, the federal government sealed off a laboratory issuing fake COVID-19 test results in Abuja.
But no one has been prosecuted and the forgery has continued.
The negligence led to travellers from Nigeria testing positive for Omicron on arrival in the UK which triggered the travel ban on December 4
