Dominica: Prime minister of Dominica, Dr. Roosevelt Skerrit, participated in the webinar hosted by the Guardian Nigeria and CS Global Partners with the theme of “Dominica Citizenship by Investment: Redefining Wealth, Safety, and Travel for Nigerians.”
Dr. Roosevelt Skerrit addressed the advantages of global mobility with a Dominican passport. To date, Dominica passport holders can travel to over 140 destinations across the world. The Prime Minister said that increasing visa-free access is a high priority for the island and its Citizenship by Investment Unit.
PM Skerrit emphasized that there are substantial attendant benefits for a Nigerian citizen also to be a citizen of Dominica.
He added, “and we do urge many of you to proceed with haste to apply to Dominica’s Citizenship by Investment Programme,”
Prime Minister Skerrit explained that global mobility meant more business opportunities, as Dominican citizenship forms access to major business hubs in Europe and Asia.
Further, he disclosed that negotiations for visa-free access to the People’s Republic of China, a country with which Dominica has close relations, were delayed by COVID-19 but are expected to come into effect in 2021.
Speaking in the webinar, PM noted, “in terms of the number of countries that Nigerian citizens can enter with a Nigerian passport compared to Dominica, there is about a two hundred percent difference. Even countries where you need to apply for visas, we have about a hundred percent success rate,”
Dominican PM also pointed that, “Our country had faced many challenges even whole world is facing lethal COVID-19 pandemic which decreased the revenue and increased the expenditure, even the employment rates also drastically decreased which created instability in the nation.”
Describing the work of his government, he said, “managed this pandemic with an accurate plan of action, but still we need reliable sources of the economy like Citizenship by Investment Unit (CBIU) so that we can utilize it for a further natural disaster.”
Prime Minister also emphasized that keeping locals and new citizens safe was also important. In the 2020 CBI Index issued by the Financial Times’ PWM magazine, Dominica scored perfectly in the due diligence category.
“We have various layers of security, of due diligence, that we follow. We are second to none. In 2021, we will be moving away from the machine-readable passports to the biometric passports, so again, further increasing the security of our passport or security of our citizenship,” PM said.
Since Nigeria’s economy observes the highest growth on the continent, more Nigerians face the need to travel out of the country, particularly for business.
However, considering major commercial hubs in Europe and Asia and their lengthy visa timelines, there has been a brewing interest in wealthy Nigerians seeking a second citizenship.
Since 1993, Dominica has been inviting high net-worth individuals and their families to become citizens once investing in either a government fund or investing in pre-approved real estate properties.
Dominica’s CBI Programme is considered the world’s best by the annual CBI Index report.
