The Ghana Card is not a travel document and cannot pass off as an e-passport, according to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Hon. Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey.
The Card, she said, cannot be used for travel to other countries either within or outside of the ECOWAS as that would require agreements with those countries for their authorities to accept the Ghana Card as a travel document.
The Minister disclosed these on Tuesday 14th June, 2022 in Parliament during question time when she responded to whether the Ghana Card represents an e-passport and whether Ghanaians no longer need passports to travel. The questions stood in the name of Ms. Zuwera Mohammed Ibrahima, the Member of Parliament for Salaga South.
Hon. Ayorkor Botchwey stated that though the Ghana Card bears the technical features of an e-passport, there is still a long way to go for it to be recognized as such.
She said, “The Ghana Card is not a replacement for our current biometric passport. The Ghana Card may serve as an optional travel document to be used in tandem with our biometric passport.”
“It must, however, be underscored that the passport, together with the travel certificate is the only approved travel document for Ghanaians that are internationally recognised.”
“Mr. Speaker, at the moment, the Ghana Card cannot be used for travel to other countries either within or outside of ECOWAS as that would require bilateral agreements with those countries for their authorities to accept the card as a travel document,” she added
She disclosed that the Ministry is in active discussion with ECOWAS member States and Ghana’s bilateral partners to achieve this.
The Minister averred that in light of an announcement by the Ghana Immigration Service titled “Notice to the Public: Use of Ghana Card as a Travel Document”, dated 24th February, 2022, Ghanaian and dual national holders of the Ghana card would be able to travel to Ghana using the Ghana Card.
An e-passport is an international travel document that contains the bio-data of its holder on a microchip.
It has robust security features against identity and other forms of document fraud, thereby rendering it the travel document of choice for most countries.
Mr. Ayorkor Botchwey noted, however, that by contrast, the Ghana Card, as defined in section 19 of the National Identification Authority Act, 2006 (Act 707) is “an identity card with a personal identification number issued by the Authority for purposes of identification of a person to whom the card is issued.
She added that the card is principally an identification document and not an e-passport, which is essentially a travel document.