By Amos Muang Nsah
The Directorate General of Documentation and Immigration (DGDI), Gabon, has announced the possibility of renewing passports of Gabonese abroad, online by simply sending an e-mail and / or on his internet.
As the African Governance Report gathered, the innovation is aimed at reducing administrative slowness and above all, reducing Covid-19 contamination rate.
To do this, the user must go to the DGDI website to download the application form, fill it out and attach the supporting documents such as a copy of the birth certificate, a color passport sized photo on a white background and a copy of the applicant’s residence permit.
Payment and withdrawal as we learned will be made through the consular representations of the country as is already the case today.
The announcement of this “e-passport” service therefore comes to reduce cost and time taken by Gabonese to obtain this document.
Periodic passport establishment and renewal missions before this announcement were often organized by the DGDI.
These missions for example in Canada were carried out on a five-year basis: the last mission took place in January 2015 and the next was expected in 2020.
To remedy this long waiting period, the DGDI among other reasons, has come out with this e-passport service.
