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Over 82,000 passports issued to date in 2018
Minister of Citizenship Winston Felix says that for 2018, 59,079 passports were issued by Guyana’s Central Immigration Authority and 6,143 passports were issued in Regions 6 and 10. In the diaspora, 17,310 persons residing in 30 different countries also received passports. This amounts to a total of 82,532 passports issued so far for the year.
Minister of Citizenship, Winston Felix
The Minister made these announcements in his budget speech at Parliament of Guyana, yesterday.
Felix also said that the Department of Citizenship registered 298 foreigners, who received citizenship through marriage, descent or ordinary residence.
The department further issued 979 work permits to nationals of other countries, including 225 Cubans, 175 Chinese, 165 Americans, 120 Indians, 70 Filipinos, 75 Venezuelans, 59 Britons, 45 Dominicans, 30 Trinidadians and 15 Surinamese.
For 2019, the Minister said, “This year will bear witness to the improvement in production of the new e-passport system.” The new passport will take 10 years to expire, as opposed to five years for the current passport.
The regular Guyanese passport will be replaced by a passport carrying an electronic chip, which holds the same information printed on the regular passport’s pages, including name, date of birth and other biographic information.
The Minister said that the new passport will utilise technologies that will make the biographic and biometric data on it more secure. Hence, the passports will be more difficult to duplicate or fraudulently produce.
Felix said that the e-passport has inspired great confidence in the security measures in other CARICOM countries that have already adopted it, including The Bahamas, Grenada, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Antigua and Barbuda, and St. Kitts and Nevis. He said that those countries’ passports have caused a reduced risk of tampering and identification fraud, and that they help authorities to ensure the passport is authentic.
The Minister stated that the passport system will be overhauled, including the addition of technological equipment that will help to monitor Guyana’s borders, so that criminal elements will not be able to enter the country undetected.
The government will be installing 10 automated passport kiosks at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA). Felix said the kiosks will allow authorized travelers, including Guyanese nationals and potentially small groups of foreigners with e-passports, to quickly pass through the system.
Travellers will also have the option of having their photos taken and providing certain personal information, which would allow their data to be biometrically matched with their e-passport. The traveler would then be given a receipt containing an immigratory code that they can show to immigration officers at the kiosk, which will offer entry into the country.
In 2019, there will be two streams of passports; the 32-page issue and the 48-page issue for frequent fliers, including members of the judiciary, parliamentarians and public servants.
The Minister said that persons applying for passports will be allowed to have their passports expedited, with completion within 24 hours. This will incur a cost of $20,000. This will not accommodate persons who have lost or damaged their passport.
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