President Mnangagwa launched the e-passport in December
last year, which is aimed at enhancing security by preventing identity theft
and forgery. Issuing of the e-passports started in January but has only been
confined to Harare while provincial Civil Registry Department Offices were
still processing traditional old passports.
However, it has emerged that the department has almost
finished installing all the necessary infrastructure at the Bulawayo office
with work on the processing expected to start at the end of the month.
A visit to the offices on Friday revealed that the
department has finished building a shade where people will be housed while
processing the documents. On one side senior citizens and those with
disabilities will be served exclusively.
A CBZ bank passport branch office has also been
established. The fee for processing of an e-passport has been pegged at US$100
in addition to a US$20 application fee, paid directly to CBZ.
Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage Minister Kazembe Kazembe
told Sunday News in an interview on Friday that all the facilities have been
put in place at the Bulawayo office.
“Yes, facilities have been put in place in Bulawayo to
start issuing the e-passports. Bulawayo will be followed by Gwanda,” he said.
Although Minister Kazembe was non-committal on the dates,
officials in Harare and at the office confirmed that they were told by
authorities that the office will be open at the end of the month.
“Staff has been trained and by end of this month we will
start processing the e-passport,” said a senior official in the department.
Minister Kazembe, however, said citizens who had applied
for the old passports should not panic as government will continue to issue
them out and clear the backlog.
“Those who had applied for the old passport are still going
to get them as we are going to clear the backlog. They are going to be used
until they expire. I know people are panicking thinking that there is a
deadline in the near future. No, they should be able to collect their passports
and in fact we are still issuing those passports.
We are going to print all of them and issue them to the
applicants. In fact the two passports will be used for quite some time until we
are able to phase the old ones out,” he said.
Minister Kazembe said the e-passport had an advantage over
the old one as it was in sync with the technology prevailing across the world.
“However, it is to your advantage if you are a citizen to
have the e-passport, but if you want to wait for the old one, it’s up to you.
But as we go forward, it will be difficult for you to use your machine readable
passport because of advancement of technology. You will go to some countries in
Europe or in the West where they now have two routes (queues at ports of entry).
There is one for the machine readable passport where you
will see up to 300 people in the queue and in the smart route you will find no
one. This is because technology can now validate your passport within a second.
This happens through the chip on the electronic passport.
That chip contains your biometric characteristics. They are
embedded on that chip. So, as you present your passport to the reader, all of
your information is then validated into official recognition,” he said.
The move to issue e-passports is in line with the
Government’s vision of a modernised economy through the application of advanced
information and communication technology systems. Key features of the new
e-passport include, among others, an electronic cover with a chip and a security
thread fully embedded in the inner booklet pages.
The Government has indicated that more centres will be able
to process the e-passport by the end of this year.
Apart from local centres, the Government has said it
intends to indentify about 15 missions and countries across the world to do
applications for the Diaspora community. Sunday News
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