Staff Reporter

Members of the public who had submitted their passport applications at the beginning of January 2018 will be collecting their passports in the E-passport format.  This was revealed by the Acting Registrar General Henri Machiri during a press conference, adding that the electronic passports will be useable starting from Monday next week.

“Members of the public and all our valued stakeholders are therefore advised that the E-passport will be usable at all our ports of entry and exit, with effect from Monday 7 February 2022.  The nation will be kept informed on any further developments surrounding the ongoing implementation of the E-passport.

“This means that those who had applied since 18 January 2020 in Harare, are now collecting their  E- passports,” said Mr Machiri.

The process of applying for the E-passport is smoother now, as all processes are done under one roof with a banking hall for payment of the passport application fee.  This process has removed the middle man who made passport application seem expensive due to their underhand dealings. 

There is more order at the Passport Office.  When they started producing the E-passport they were serving 50 people per day and now they are serving 500.  The collection time was also significantly reduced to seven working days.

Meanwhile, the first batch of E-passports is out and people who made their applications by 28 January 2020, collected their passports at the Civil Registry in Harare yesterday.