At least 1,917 Nigerians sought asylum in the Netherlands between 2024 and 2025, according to data from the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service.
The figures were contained in the Netherlands country reports for 2024 and 2025 under the Asylum Information Database, compiled for the AIDA project by the Dutch Council for Refugees, VluchtelingenWerk Nederland, and published using data from the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service, known as the IND, and Eurostat.
Nigeria was among only four African nationalities that featured in the Netherlands’ top 10 countries of origin for asylum applicants in both years.
The number of Nigerian applicants increased from 931 in 2024 to 986 in 2025, representing a 5.9 per cent rise.
In 2024, the 931 applications comprised 770 first-time applicants and 161 subsequent applicants.
The following year, 813 Nigerians applied for asylum for the first time, while 173 were subsequent applicants.
However, the figures did not include Nigerians who entered the Netherlands through family reunification, meaning the total number of Nigerians who joined relatives in the country during the period was not reflected in the asylum statistics.
Nigeria ranked ninth among the top nationalities seeking asylum in the Netherlands in 2024.
The list was led by Syria with 11,655 applications, followed by Iraq with 2,306, Türkiye with 1,905, Eritrea with 1,506, and applicants with an “Unknown” nationality category, which recorded 1,437 applications.
Algeria had 1,216 applications, Somalia 1,119, Yemen 1,089, while Iran recorded 742.
In 2025, Nigeria climbed to sixth place among the identified nationalities, behind Syria with 3,373 applications, Eritrea with 3,178, Türkiye with 1,530, Algeria with 1,454 and Somalia with 1,384.
Nigeria was ahead of Afghanistan, which recorded 803 applications, Sudan with 796 and Pakistan with 689.
Among African countries, Eritrea recorded the highest number of asylum applications across the two years, with 4,684, followed by Algeria with 2,670, Somalia with 2,503 and Nigeria with 1,917.
Sudan appeared among the top 10 in 2025 with 796 applications, while its 2024 figure was included under the “Others” category.
The identified African nationalities accounted for at least 12,570 applications out of the 59,599 asylum applications recorded in the Netherlands during the two-year period, representing approximately 21.1 per cent.
High rejection rate for Nigerians
The data also showed a high rejection rate for Nigerian asylum seekers in 2025.
Of the 515 first-instance decisions involving Nigerians that year, 425, representing 83 per cent, were rejected.
Only 65 applicants, or 13 per cent, were granted refugee status, while 10 applicants, representing two per cent, received subsidiary protection.
Another 15, or three per cent, received humanitarian protection, a derived status generally granted to family members of recognised refugees.
Across all nationalities, the Netherlands recorded a 52 per cent rejection rate in 2025, while 48 per cent of applicants received protection.
Nigeria therefore recorded a significantly higher rejection rate and a lower protection rate than the overall figures.
Comparable figures for Nigeria were not available for 2024 because the country did not rank among the top 10 nationalities by decisions that year.
Nigeria was also not classified by the Dutch government as a “safe country of origin” before the designation was suspended nationwide in September 2025 following rulings by the Court of Justice of the European Union.
Countries that had been placed on the safe-country list included Ghana, Morocco, Senegal and Tunisia, among others.
The report also disclosed that a Nigerian was involved in one of only two cases in the Netherlands in which the authorities invoked the “first country of asylum” principle.
The concept applies where an asylum seeker is presumed to have already obtained protection in a third country.
It read, “In 2025, only two cases of application of the first country of asylum were dealt with by a Dutch court.The cases concerned Nigeria and the West Bank as the first country of asylum. Both cases were dismissed by the Court, as it was unclear whether the applicants could be admitted to these countries.”
Meanwhile, the Dutch parliament passed a bill in April 2026 establishing a “two-status system” that separates refugees from people granted subsidiary protection.
Under the proposed system, people with subsidiary protection status would have to meet additional conditions, including a longer waiting period, an income requirement and a housing requirement, before they could qualify for family reunification.
