Executive Secretary to the Vice President, Augustine Yaw Blay, has revealed that the GhanaCard has embedded in it a chip which makes it recognized as an e-passport for individuals to travel with.
According to him, the National Identification Card (GhanaCard) has met all the requirements of an electronic passport. In explaining what the e-passport is, Mr Blay noted that the e-passport is a chip and not a “book or paper” and that the authenticity of the chip must meet a certain standard set by ICAO to be validated. He initmated that an individual must have a chip similar to a SIM card to store his information on it and that “any machine in the world that is ICAO compliant should be able to read it”.
Mr Blay indicated that for cybersecurity reasons, not every machine can read the information stored on the chip since it has to be secured. By this, he iterated that every e-passport is a chip that has the information on an individual on it.
His comments follow government’s earlier announcement that it had been officially presented with the certificate to make the Ghana Card an e-passport to be accepted at 44,000 airports across the globe.
“That is what e-passport is. The GhanaCard now has a chip. The GhanaCard has a chip, our passport today doesn’t have the chip so, it doesn’t qualify as an e-passport. So, once you begin to put that chip in our passport, you now have an e-passport. So, GhanaCard as we stand today, the chip that qualifies as e-passport is in the GhanaCard… GhanaCard as it stands, has the e-passport embedded in it”.
Augustine Blay
GhanaCard validated as a passport
Mr Blay confirmed that on the 9th of February 2022, ICAO stated that the chip that Ghana has in its GhanaCards has met the standard for e-passport. As such, one can store information on it as ICAO has tested, validated and authenticated its usage.
Commenting on whether Ghana has bilateral agreement with countries outside ECOWAS since parliament has to ratify the process, Mr Blay indicated that parliament hasn’t yet started the process. He revealed that the right infrastructure has to be in place for that to happen. That notwithstanding, he noted that Ghanaians can travel to other ECOWAS countries that Ghana has bilateral relations with.
“Where we don’t have bilateral or multilateral agreement, the ministry of foreign affairs will work with them so that we can start travelling out with them”.
Augustine Blay
Mr Blay clarified that for countries such as UK and US where visas are required, “no embassy will put their visa on there [GhanaCard]”. As such, one has to go along with their passport to have their visa placed in the passport.
Nonetheless, the Executive Secretary of the Vice President expressed that from the 1st of March when the country commences implementation, all airports that “any Ghanaian that comes to their station, countries and airports around the world, coming into Ghana, when they show the GhanaCard, they should allow the person to come in for Ghana has recognized the GhanaCard as travel document”.
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