BREAKING: Buhari Heeds Advice On Coronavirus, Bans Travel From 13 Countries

The President Muhammadu Buhari administration has imposed travel restriction on countries with over 1,000 cases of Coronavirus (COVID-19).

The countries include China, Iran, South Korea, Germany, Italy, USA, UK, Switzerland, Norway, Netherlands, Spain, France and Japan.

The travel restriction was announced by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Mustapha, who is the chairman of the  Presidential Task Force on coronavirus,  during a media briefing on Wednesday.

“The Nigerian government is restricting entry into the country for travellers from the following countries; China, Italy, Iran, South Korea, Spain, Japan, France, Germany, Norway, U.S, the United Kingdom, Netherlands and Switzerland. These are all countries with over 1,000 cases domestically,” Mustapaha was quoted to have said in a tweet by the federal government (@NigeriaGov).

The SGF said the government was “temporarily suspending all visas issued to nationals from these countries. Nigerians arriving from these countries will be subjected to supervised isolation for 14 days.

“Nigeria is also advising all Nigerians to avoid travel to these countries. These restrictions will come into effect from Fri 20 March 2020 for 4 weeks subject to review,” he said.

Meanwhile, the development is coming weeks after individuals and groups, including former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, advised the president to suspend flights from high-risk countries.

Atiku had said, “Nigeria needs firm and decisive actions to prevent an escalation of the scourge. Recently, we closed our borders as an act against economic sabotage. Perhaps now is the time to temporarily halt flights to and from any nation with a prevalence of this scourge. It is more important to secure human lives than to secure an economy. We also need to invest in early detection facilities at our airports.

“We must call upon our experience with the Wild Ebola Virus, of which we were the first nation in the world to defeat that scourge in 2014. How did Nigeria do it? We achieved it by showing unprecedented unity. The federal government of the day worked closely with the Lagos and Rivers state governments. There was complete unity, solidarity and oneness of purpose, which created the atmosphere that defeated that deadly infestation,” he said.