Sixteen days after it imposed a ban on travelers from Nigeria and 9 other African countries, Canada has announced the removal of the countries from the ‘travel ban’ list.
The Canadian Health Minister, Jean-Yves Duclos, announced this in a video broadcast delivered from Parliament Hill, Ottawa, on Friday.
According to Duclos, the ban would be lifted at 05:59 Nigerian time on Saturday.
The ban which was first imposed on seven African countries was eventually extended to three others: They are: Nigeria, South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Eswatini, Namibia, Malawi and Egypt.
“While we recognize the controversial nature of such a prohibition, we believe it was a necessary measure to slow the arrival of Omicron in Canada.
“Given the current situation, this measure has served its purpose and is no longer needed,” said the Canadian Health Minister.
Canada had imposed the ban on 10 African countries where cases of the Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus were reported.
The move had drawn backlash from the governments of various countries which described it as “discriminatory”.
Duclos, however, stated that the country would reimpose its requirement for Canadians travelling abroad to get a COVID-19 test before returning to the country.
