COVID19 code: ”There was a system failure”- NCDC reacts to singer, 2Face Idibia’s call out

The Nigeria Center for Disease Control NCDC has reacted to its call-out by singer 2face Idibia.

2Face, in a video shared on his IG page, accused the agency of ‘frustrating’ Nigerians traveling home from other countries with regards to the COVID19 test results. In a video posted on his Instagram page, the singer expressed frustration about the poor work ethics of NCDC officials. He made particular reference to the center’s website and the staff who, according to him, are never available to pick up calls when Nigerians who need their assistance try to reach them. He said some Nigerians are stranded at the airport because they cannot access the NCDC website or staff to help them generate a QR code that will validate their COVID19 test results.

The NCDC said it experienced a system failure on its COVID19 travel portal via its Twitter handle.

”On the 20th of April, a system failure by one of the partner organisations supporting the management of the COVID-19 travel portal led to an unforeseen downtime. The technical failure was resolved following about 12 hours of downtime.

We accept full responsibility for this event, which led to inconvenience for several travelers to Nigeria. We have learnt from this occurrence & continue to restructure our systems to avoid future events like this and serve Nigerians better.

Our commitment remains to protect the health of Nigerians, by reducing the risk of spread of the virus. This is why the Nigerian International Travel Portal was introduced by introduced by @PTFCOVID19. We’ll continue strengthening this process to make it seamless for travelers.”