44,000 airports to accept 'Ghana Card' as e-passports in 2022 – Dr Bawumia
Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia
• 'Ghana Card' holders will soon be able to travel
Read full article• Government is working with ICAO
• 44,000 airports will soon recognize the Card
Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia has stated the ‘Ghana Card’ will by the end of the first quarter of 2022, be accepted as an e-passport in 197 borders globally and 44,000 airports in the world.
According to him, the unique biometric identification card issued by Ghana’s National Identification Authority (NIA) will ensure Ghanaians in the diaspora can effectively travel.
“The Ghana card will be recognized as an e-passport and can be read and verified in all [International Civil Aviation Organization] ICAO compliant borders (in 197 countries and 44,000 airports in the world). When this happens, holders of the Ghana Card will be allowed to board any flight to Ghana.”
“Furthermore, the good news for diasporan Ghanaians is that when the Ghana Immigration Service is linked to the NIA architecture, diasporan Ghanaians who hold the Ghana card should not have to obtain visas to travel to Ghana.”
The Vice President said this when he delivered a public lecture on digitalisation at the Ashesi University on Tuesday November 2, 2021.
He added the Ghana Card will further assist embassies and Ghanaian missions abroad to establish the identity of Ghanaians who bear the card.
Meanwhile, the vice president said government is teeming efforts with the International Civil Aviation Organization to globally activate the e-passport function of the Ghana Card through the ICAO Public Key Directory (PKD) which is a central repository for exchanging the information required to authenticate e-passports.
“We expect this to be operational by the end of the first quarter of next year. Ghana is one of the few countries in the world where the national ID card is also an e-passport,” added.
