Ghana card to be used as e-passport in 197 countries soon - Bawumia

Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has disclosed that Ghana has since the beginning of the year, engaged the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), to activate the E-passport function of the Ghana card.

He said if the processes succeeds, it means that by the end of the first quarter of 2022, the Ghana card would be recognized globally in all ICAO borders with 197 countries as members and 44,000 airports and borders.

Dr. Bawumia said on October 13, 2021, Ghana became the 79th member of ICAO’s Public Directory Community, and Ghana’s signing certificate would soon be incorporated into the system.

He said by this move, the Ghana card would be verified by the member countries and holders of the card would be allowed to board any flight to Ghana.

Furthermore, the good news for diasporans is that when the Ghana Immigration Service is linked to the National Identification Authority, diasporan Ghanaians with the Ghana card should not have to obtain visas to return to Ghana.

He explained that the Ghana card was a unique way to build a system for the identification of Ghanaians.

He said some 15.7 million Ghanaians had been enrolled on the Ghana card system, and several would soon be enrolled.

Read Below what the Vice President said

We have been working with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) this year to globally activate the e-passport function of the Ghanacard and I am happy to announce that on 13th October 2021, Ghana officially became the 79th member of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Public Key Directory (PKD) community. The ICAO Public Key Directory (PKD) is a central repository for exchanging the information required to authenticate e-passports.

The PKD allows border control authorities to confirm in less than ten seconds that the e-passport was issued by the right authority, has not been altered, and is not a copy or cloned document. Ghana’s Country Signing Certificate Authority would therefore soon be imported into the ICAO PKD System through what is known as a Key ceremony. The Key Ceremony for Ghana will be held at the ICAO headquarters in Montreal Canada hopefully by the 1st quarter of 2022.

This means that the Ghanacard will be recognized as an e-passport and can be read and verified in all 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 Ghanacard should not have to obtain visas to travel to Ghana. 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.

The Ghana card is also being linked with existing passports so that travel history will be preserved. The Ghana card is already valid for travel to all ECOWAS countries. I should note that the national ID project was executed by the NIA in collaboration with a world-class Ghanaian private sector firm, (IMS) Margins. So proud of them.