The speaker of Uganda’s parliament Rebecca Kadaga has thrown doubt on the process of rolling out and implementing the new C.
On a post via her Facebook page, the speaker queried the high costs in acquiring the new passports for citizens. An ordinary passport will now cost 250000 shillings and for one to get an express passport they will have to part with an extra 150,000/- on top of the base fee.
The speaker queried the entire process from the legality to the ease of administration and the costs.
“I don’t think there is a country recognized as East Africa for it to be able to issue passports”, queried the speaker. “I also don’t know whether the EAC President’s directive was ever brought to the attention of parliament”, she went on to ask.
“The protocol has not yet been read here in parliament so where is the legal authority of changing the Ugandan passport to an East African passport?”
more members of parliament have also the queried the new passports, with Kampala central MP Muhammad Nsereko questioning how people who have just acquired new 10 year passports are to go back and get new passports at extra costs.
The ministry of internal affairs had recently embarked on a sensitization campaign on the rationale of the new passports and it is evident they have a lot of work to do as regards education of the masses who will be affected by the changes.
The process of phasing out the old paper passports was set to start in January 2019 and all people with the old passports had been given 2 years to return them irrespective of the date of issuance.
The new passports are expected to be more secure and reduce cross border crime, combat terrorism and passport fraud with electronic chips containing a holders data embossed in the passport.
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