There is ongoing conversations concerning the usability of the Ghana Card as a travelling doc. But there seems to be extra propaganda than information within the public area.
In the final couple of days, I’ve made some efforts to cross-check the veracity of the claims of the Ghana Card as a travelling doc.
While getting back from Nairobi on September 21, 2024, an immigration officer was asking to see the passports of travellers. A person behind me stated he wish to use his Ghana Card, however the official advised him she would nonetheless must see his passport.
I later requested an official behind the counter why they wanted to see the passport when the traveller has a Ghana Card. He acknowledged that they nonetheless must see the passport as a result of they couldn’t course of the Ghana Card.
However, getting back from Johannesburg early this morning I sought to know from the immigration officer if I might enter the nation with my Ghana Card. He stated sure, and pointed to a sticker on the counter studying “Ghana Card”. He defined additional that they’ve the cardboard reader and will learn the cardboard, and whichever doc I wish to use, both my passport or the Ghana Card can be acceptable. He added that they’ve the cardboard reader, explaining additional that, even when I used to be coming into the nation with my passport, they wouldn’t must stamp in it, and so I might produce my Ghana Card and it will be accepted.
Meanwhile, the Ghana Card is an Electronic Machine Readable Travel Document (eMRTD), as Ghana is a member of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Public Key Directory (PKD).
“This directory serves as a central repository for exchanging the information required to authenticate electronic eMRTDs, such as ePassports, electronic ID cards, and Visible Digital Seals. The Ghana Card can therefore be used as an ePassport, provided there is a bilateral agreement between Ghana and the destination country,” says Raymond Bayor, a former Communications Specialist at ICAO.
In different phrases, the Ghana Card can be utilized as journey doc to enter any nation that Ghana has a bilateral settlement with to make the cardboard the appropriate journey doc. Until that’s finished, Ghanaian travellers, can solely use the cardboard to enter Ghana and never every other nation.
Within the ECOWAS group, the place many of the nations, notably, Francophone West Africa use nationwide ID playing cards broadly as journey paperwork, it is rather possible potential to make use of the Ghana Card as a journey doc inside West Africa.
By Emmanuel Ok Dogbevi
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