17,000 passports to be cleared in May – Hannah Tetteh reveals

The Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Ms Hanna Tetteh has disclosed that the plethora of challenges at the passport office is one of her “biggest headaches.”

The Passport Office has been struggling to print passport booklets to meet the high demands due to a breakdown of the machines.That situation reportedly caused a  stampede at the entrance of the office; applicants who were given dates to come for their passports were disappointed when they were asked to return on other dates because passports could not be printed. The Office had to rely on just two machines to print passport booklets.

Many Ghanaians have also complained about unnecessary bureaucratic practices and corruption at the office , making the acquisition and renewal of passports very difficult.

However speaking at a joint interview with Citi FM and Radio Gold, the Minister said she is “very much aware of what is happening in the passport office. It’s one of my biggest headaches.”

Backlog of 17,000 passports to be cleared in May

She revealed that government had ordered two new passport printing machines to clear the backlog of thousands of passport booklets stuck at the Passport Office.

She also disclosed that the over 21,000 passport backlog has been reduced to 17,000.

She projected that within a month, the 17,000 passports will be printed for their respective owners.

According to her, a couple of Ghana Missions in countries which have large numbers of Ghanaian nationals have been selected to print passports.

This, she said will reduce the pressures on the centralized office in Accra.

“We’ve picked a couple of our Missions where we have large Ghanaian diasporas…and they are also deploying the same passport printing equipment to those Missions so that the rush is not going to be on the passport office in Accra,” she explained.

The same equipment will be delivered to the various passport application centers in the regions.

–By: citifmonline.com