Ghana Card to be recognized as an Electronic Passport in 197 countries by 2022 – Bawumia

The Ghana card, is set to be recognized as an electronic passport in 197 countries by 2022, the Vice President disclosed yesterday at a public lecture on the digitization of the economy at the Ashesi University in Accra.

“The Ghana card will be recognized as an e-passport and can be read and verified in all [International Civil Aviation Organization] ICAO compliant borders (in 197 countries and 44,000 airports in the world). When this happens, holders of the Ghana card will be allowed to board any flight to Ghana,” Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia said.

He also announced that the Bank of Ghana, has completed the technical work and started the process to launch the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), also known as the e-cedi in 2022, but quickly clarified that the e-cedi is not a cryptocurrency, adding that citizens will get to hold currencies in the form of digital wallets.

“The e-cedi is simply the digital form of the physical cedi in circulation. It is a legal tender issued and backed by the central bank. With the digital currency, citizens and residents both the banked and unbanked will hold currency in the form of a digital wallet.”

“Cash transactions will therefore be drastically reduced,” he said.

He was particularly confident the electronic passport will make travelling for Ghanaians in the diaspora more convenient.

“…the good news for diasporan Ghanaians is that when the Ghana Immigration Service is linked to the NIA architecture, diasporan Ghanaians, who hold the Ghana card, should not have to obtain visas to travel to Ghana.”

Spelling out other benefits of the Ghana card, the Vice President, said Ghanaian missions and other embassies abroad will be able to establish the identity of Ghanaians using the Ghana card.

Dr Bawumia, said the government has been working with the International Civil Aviation Organization to globally activate the e-passport function of the Ghana card.

“We expect this to be operational by the end of the first quarter of next year. Ghana is one of the few countries in the world where the national ID card is also an e-passport,” he said.

Ghana card registration, has been a subject of debate in the country in recent times, following a directive from the Ministry of Communications that only the Ghana card, will be used as proof of identity for SIM card re-registration.

The Controller and Accountant General’s Department, also tried to get government workers to register for the Ghana Card or be denied their salaries.

This directive was later rescinded after some protests from government workers and criticism from observers.

Currently, Ghana card numbers are being used as tax identification numbers by the government.

Over 15 million Ghanaians, have been registered for their Ghana Card, representing about 84percent of the population aged 15 and above.

According to Dr. Bawumia, the e-cedi, will bring transparency to all transactions within the economy, which hitherto used to be by cash.

“When implemented, the incidence of fake or counterfeit currencies and bullion van robberies will be drastically reduced.”

Touching on recent developments in the banking space, the Vice President, indicated that new systems put in place by the government, has made it easy for all prospective bank customers to open accounts remotely through their mobile phones without visiting a branch or filling out forms.

“It is simple, fast, and easy to use, and clients need only a valid national ID card and no additional documentation to open an instant account. In addition, since the account opening process is USSD based (i.e. a service that allows people without a smartphone or data or internet connection to use mobile banking through a code).”

Dr Bawumia, also used the opportunity to defend the government’s focus on digitalisation of the economy.

According to him, the previous systems of going about business transactions without technology have been disadvantageous.

He said: “This [analogue] system frustrates, other than helping ordinary people. Why is it that after 60 years of independence of this country, the system remained basically the same or in some cases worsened? The goal upon assumption of office was to quickly transform our economy by leveraging on the technology advancement as means to leapfrog the advancement and developmental process that comes with the legacy problems of both economic and public sector governance. This is why digitalisation has been a major focus of the Nana Addo government”.

He added that challenging the status quo, has been misconstrued to mean a deviation of the government’s primary aim of revamping the ailing Ghanaian economy.

The Vice President, maintained that digitalizing the economy would rather yield a more positive result.

“Unfortunately, many people do not appreciate the link between digitization and economic development. I have heard people say I am abandoning economics for digitization. Far from abandoning economics, the reality is that in this era, if you don’t digitize you will not have much of an economy, period! Indeed, digital policy is economic policy!”

Source: TheHeraldghana