The NIS spokesperson, Mr Tony Akuneme, disclosed this in a statement in Abuja.

Akuneme said the Comptroller-General, Mr Isa Jere, had dispatched Assistant Comptrollers General to the various zones to ensure that all uncollected passports were distributed to their owners.

“Nigerians are equally urged to go to the passport offices where they applied for passports and check,” he said.

Akuneme further advised passport applicants to refrain from going through third parties to ensure the timely processing of their applications.

“We discovered that over 60% of passport applications are completed by third parties who input wrong contact information for their “clients”.

“So, we encourage Nigerians to endeavour to fill their passport applications by themselves and to contact us using any of our mediums,” he said.