Nigerians filed 86,815 applications to Schengen countries’ consulates in 2022, showing that 53.4 percent of the requests were approved while 39,189 applications were denied.
According to Schengen Statistics, France received the highest number of Nigerian applicants in 2022 – a total of 37,692, which indicates that 43.3 percent of all applications filed by Nigerian nationals were submitted to French consulates, VisaGuide.World reports.
On the other hand, the visa issuance rate for Nigerian nationals from French authorities has been one of the highest as 45.1 percent of applications or 39,189 requests were recorded.
Three Countries Alone Received 71.8% of All Applications
Except for France, Spain and Italy received the most visa applications by Nigerian nationals in 2022. In detail, 13,707 visa applications were filed by Nigerians in Spain while 10,949 were submitted to authorities in Italy.
Visa rejection rates in these two countries differed; Spain denied 65.6 percent of all applications, which is the highest visa rejection rate from all countries, while Italy has some of the lowest rejection rates for Nigerians – 32 percent of applications were denied.
Moreover, Spain rejected some 8,991 visa applications filed by Nigerians while Italy denied visas to 3,506 applicants.
Rejection Rates From EU Consulates Considerably High for Nigerians
On average, 45.1 percent of all applications filed by Nigerians in 2022 were rejected, accounting for 39,189 applications denied.
Countries with the highest rejection rates for Nigerian applicants were Hungary (66.1 percent), Spain (65.6 percent), Belgium (64.7 percent) and Denmark (63.8 percent).
In other words, out of 640 Nigerian applicants, 423 were rejected by Hungarian authorities, while Belgian consulates denied 2,965 out of 4,582 requests. Denmark received 1,745 applications from Nigerians and 1,113 out of those were rejected.
On the other hand, countries with the fewest rejection rates, indicating that visa approval rates were higher compared to others, include Greece, Switzerland and Italy.
Out of 952 visa applications filed to Greece, 15.1 percent were rejected, while Swiss authorities rejected 19.5 percent of all applications, showing that 507 visas were rejected from 2,600 requests.
Czechia and Austria also have lower rates of visa rejections for Nigerians, but application rates are also lower among Nigerians for these two countries.
While 1,720 applications were filed by Nigerians to Austrian consulates and another 424 to Czech consulates, the latter denied 154 of those applications accounting for 36.3 percent of all requests. In addition, Austria denied 623 visas for Nigerians in 2022, with 36.3 were denied, representing 623 requests.