ECOWAS ordinary passports: Nigeria short-visit visa exemption
The current NIS landing-card portal labels ECOWAS passports Visa Free / Exemption, while the operative ECOWAS Protocol removes visa requirements for Community citizens visiting a Member State through an official entry point for up to 90 days. This policy maps the catalog's foreign ECOWAS ordinary passports.
- The Protocol requires a valid travel document and international health certificate, limits the baseline visit to 90 days, and permits Nigeria to refuse admission to an inadmissible immigrant. It does not eliminate all border, health, security or documentary checks.
- Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger formally withdrew from ECOWAS on 29 January 2025. ECOWAS's current transition notice expressly continues their visa-free movement, residence and establishment rights until further notice; their status must be rechecked if that notice changes.
- This maps only ordinary passports for short visitor movement. It does not normalize ECOWAS travel certificates, residence or establishment rights, employment, transit, diplomatic, official, service, refugee or other special-document routes.
- The Landing and Exit Card is an immigration declaration workflow, not an ETA or a visa. Completing it does not change this exemption.
Official sourcesNigeria Immigration Service: Nigeria Immigration Service Landing and Exit CardEconomic Community of West African States: ECOWAS Protocol A/P.1/5/79 relating to free movement of persons, residence and establishmentEconomic Community of West African States: ECOWAS press statement on Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger withdrawalEconomic Community of West African States: ECOWAS current Member States