East Africa: EAC Passport for Release Next Year
Published: 10/Apr/2017
Source: Tanzania Daily News
By Marc Nkwame
Arusha — Issuance of international passports for East African Community (EAC) has been re-scheduled to early next year, the same time the African Union also intends to release its travel document.
The EAC six partner states, it was revealed at the just ended 35th EAC Council of Ministers’ meeting here, have been directed to start issuing the new East African machine readable Electronic- Passports by January 31, 2018 after preparedness of each partner state was considered.
The council directives come on the backdrop of the 17th Ordinary Summit of the EAC Heads of State that directed the partner states to issue the new EA e-Passport by January 1, 2017 and execute the phase out programme for the current machine readable East African and National Passports between January 1, 2017 and December 31, 2018.
According to the 35th EAC Council of Ministers’ official report, Burundi reported that through the Public Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement, the country had completed the process of procuring the EA e-Passport booklets and was ready to issue the document by April 3, 2017.
Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda reported to start issuing the New International EA e-passport not later than April 2017 while Tanzania will be ready to issue the East African e-Passport by January 1, 2018.
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