NGO VISA

Our international staff in Sri Lanka gets NGO Visa to stay there.
At first, we get Entry Visa for 1 week, and then get Residence Visa for 1 year.
The procedure is different from Visit Visa, but it’s difficult to get NGO Visa.

First of all, so many documents for the application are required.

1.Work permit application
2.Entry Visa application
3.Passport copy
4.CV
5.Agreement on employment
6.Educational certification
7.Terms of Reference
8.Recommendation letter from the organization
9.Police report

Police report is issued at a police station in Japan. After 2 weeks, we can receive the report. In case we request it at diplomatic establishments abroad, it may take more.
If you took your degree abroad, you need to order it and it will take more.
To prepare the all documents, roughly it takes for 3 to 4 weeks.
Then the documents are posted to Sri Lanka. It takes 1 week.

In Sri Lanka, we need to get recommendation of the application from a district where we are operating our project.
It takes more than 1 week to get it.
Next, we bring the applications to NGO Secretariat and get the permission.
NGO Secretariat is belonged to Ministry of Defense and we get security clearance at the same time.
But this part is a hurdle. To get the clearance, the applicants must be out of Sri Lanka for minimum 6 weeks. Sometimes it takes more than 2 months.
So to get the permission of the application, it takes more than 2 months.

After getting the permission and the clearance from NGO Secretariat, we can apply the Visa to Immigration office.
After 1 week, the application transfers to Embassy of Sri Lanka in Japan and the applicant is interviewed there.
After 1 more week, we can receive Entry Visa at last.

The total period is 4 months; 1 month is for the document preparation, 2 months are for the permission and 2 weeks are for the application.
After the arrival, the applicant has to prepare Entry Visa application. So the application can’t feel relaxed.

This is an invisible difficult story for NGO.

Administration & Finance Officer
Tomoo Nasuda

【JEN is now accepting donations. Your help would be very much appreciated.
DONATE here】