Following the announcement of another case of Coronavirus yesterday, a lawyer based in Abuja, has filed a suit before the Federal High Court, directing the Federal Government to stop issuing Visas to Iranian, Chinese and Italian nationals.

He said that even the most advanced nations have taken extreme travel measures to ensure that their populace was safe and that the Nigerian Government cannot be playing with the lives of millions of Nigerians like they are doing. He added that, should this lackadaisical approach by the government continue, the poor people of Nigeria stand a very high risk of being eliminated by this deadly virus.

The lawyer, who goes by the name Johnmary Jideobi, said the suit was “propelled by the urgent need to protect the public health of all Nigerians susceptible to infection of the dangerous Coronavirus Disease 2019 that originated from China and has been spreading like wildfire to many parts of the world”.

He added “even the most advanced countries ” had been taking “extreme travel measures” as a precaution, but the “Federal Government of Nigeria has continued to expose millions of hapless, poor and extremely vulnerable Nigerians to the grave but avoidable risk of being eliminated by this extremely dangerous disease by continuing to allow flights from the countries known to be highly infected with the dangerous disease into the Nigerian airspace.”

He further said that the Federal Government are under obligation to ensure the lives of Nigerians are safe.

He therefore requested that, “a mandatory order directing the Federal Government of Nigeria (through her Diplomatic Missions abroad) to cease issuing Nigerian visa (of any category) to citizens of China, Iran and Italy forthwith until and unless the WHO authoritatively confirms that the spiral spread of the dangerous Coronavirus Disease 2019 has effectively been tamed and totally contained.”

The Attorney General of the Federation is the sole defendant in this case.