Praneeta Prakash 
[Source: fijihighcommission.au]
The Immigration Department will now open passport offices until 8pm to help clear the current backlog.
Immigration Minister Viliame Naupoto says the move comes as 35,000 new passport books are expected to arrive later this month.
Speaking in Parliament, Naupoto confirmed that the first batch from a larger order of 100,000 passports has already arrived.
He says the aim is to clear all pending passport applications by the end of next month.
Naupoto also apologized to Fijians affected by the delays and says the Ministry is working to improve processing times.
“We would like to reduce the turnaround time for normal processing from 15 to 10 working days and for urgent from 3 to 2 working days. An allocation of $5 million is also provided in this budget for the purchase of a further 200,000 blank passport books.”
He added that the Ministry is also addressing visa and permit backlogs. Out of 31,144 total applications reviewed, 9,843 still needed full processing.
Naupoto says 6,831 of those have already been cleared, and they aim to complete the remaining 3,012 within two weeks.
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