The Government has pledged to exercise extra due diligence in the issuance of passports within South Africa and other foreign countries, to ensure that such documents are only provided to bona fide Zimbabwean citizens.
This was said by Transport and Infrastructural Development Minister Felix Mhona, who was acting Leader of Government business in Parliament on Wednesday, June 26.
In response to a question from Silobela Member of Parliament Jonah Nyevera of ZANU PF, who had inquired about the measures implemented by the Government to ensure that only Zimbabwean citizens benefit from the facility, Minister Mhona said:
I want to assure the August House that we have our Embassy in that respective country, where they do due diligence before issuance of passports.
Whatever they will be doing in the foreign land, they will be corresponding with officials in Zimbabwe and in this particular case, our headquarters here in Harare.
I want to assure the Honourable Member that transparency, accountability and due diligence will be upheld.
The Consul-General at Zimbabwe’s Embassy in Johannesburg Eria Phiri recently revealed that the consulate was conducting a trial run of the electronic passport (e-passport) processing centre. He said:
The trial run will allow the Consulate to gauge the level of system responsiveness and effectiveness in a real-world environment before the full rollout to the public.
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