By Hannah Dadzie
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration is to introduce chip-embedded passports by the second quarter of next year. This new passport will run along with the current biometric passports for some time before they are faced out.
Speaking at a media briefing on updates on Passports and Consular services in Accra, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Kwaku Ampratwum-Sarpong, said the Ministry is committed to enhancing service delivery for the benefit of all citizens by transforming the Passport office
“We have to crawl before we run. We are at the moment using biometric but we want to upgrade to chip embedded, so let’s go smoothly. So the chip embedded is going to cost more, and if we continue sitting at 8 dollars, we will continue to have the problems that we are having at the passport office. No magic can be done by the officers over there. Moving from the biometric to the chip embedded is a requirement from the international civil aviation authority. It is asking all countries who are on biometric to upgrade to the chip-embedded passport,” the Deputy Minister said.
Mr Ampratwum-Sarpong said the chip-embedded passport gives improved security features and makes it more difficult for fraudsters to do their business.
“Since a passport is a serious security document that needs not be tampered with or abused, moving from biometric to chip embedded is for our security and to also make life easier and better for all of us. We are modernized, we are moving digitalization. Chip embedded is an upgrade on digitalization so we have to get there and be one of the leading lights.” He added
Mr Ampratwum-Sarpong said they are in consultation with stakeholders for the upward adjustment of the Passport Application fees. This has become imperative to provide enough resources to the office to address the myriad of challenges confronting passport applications. According to the Deputy Minister, Ghanaian passports are the cheapest in the West African Subregion; therefore, there is going to be an engagement with Parliament and various committees to review the fee.
“As we speak, we don’t have enough computers to be able to do the capturing, we don’t have enough printers to print the passport booklets, there’re all kinds of things going on there, all this create room for the corruption and the borrow boys. Our passport happens to be the cheapest in the whole west African region. Ghana passport cost 8 dollars, the next cheapest is Liberia is 40 dollars, the supplier of Liberian passport and Ghana passport is one company, so our passport is heavily subsidized the money that we are supposed to use to buy the computers and the printers to be able to provide quick service delivery is being used to subsidized the passport that people apply,” the Deputy Minister stated.
“We are in consultation with the various stakeholders and hopefully our next attempt is to engage with parliament because we on our own cannot increase the passport fees. We will need the support of parliament to make it happen, we are engaging them and we hope that in the coming weeks we will have a formal sitting with the parliament and the various committee to see if they can help us in that direction to make it possible for us to charge at least the proper fees. I cannot sit here and give the proper fees because the fees will have to be fixed by committee, we are engaging with the Ministry of Finance and with approval by parliament. So, the final figure will be determined by parliament,” Mr Ampratwum-Sarpong noted.
