Call to collect processed passports from Dept of Civil Registry

THE Department of Civil Registry has said it has stockpiles of passports processed over the years lying uncollected as owners have not claimed them.

Speaking on the sidelines of an inter-ministerial Review and Validation of Comprehensive Assessment Report of Zimbabwe's Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CVRS) Systems workshop in Victoria Falls recently, Registrar General Mr Henry Tawona Machiri appealed to Zimbabweans who applied for passports over the years and have not collected them to do so.

He said the department is in the process of quantifying the passports and grouping them by province.

Mr Machiri said they will soon publicise the names of their owners in the press.

Over the years, Zimbabweans struggled to access passports and the country had challenges with the special passport paper and this resulted in backlog that accumulated over the years.

The Civil Registry has since cleared the backlog following roll out of the e-passport system that was launched by President Mnangagwa in December 2021.

Mr Machiri said some of the passports have expired before being collected.

A Zimbabwean passport is valid for 10 years for adults and five years for children.

"We have passports that have not been collected and the owners are moving around. Some of the passports have even expired on the shelves without being collected. The reasons could be that the client may have passed on before collecting their documents.

"So we are encouraging citizens to come and collect these passports, especially those that are still valid. We are going to be publicizing these passports so that owners know which ones are still valid and where to collect them," said Mr Machiri.

He said an exercise is underway to quantify them and group them by province and station where the application was made.

A few years ago an ordinary passport used to take three months to be processed before the process started to take much longer as a result of a number of challenges.

This resulted in the backlog which has since been cleared.

At the moment, an ordinary passport takes seven days while an emergency passport is processed within 48 hours, and applicants are encouraged to check after that stipulated time.

The Civil Registry Department uses a short message service to notify applicants once the passport is out. The short message system has been in place since 2012.

However, Mr Machiri said some may have missed the message after losing their mobile phones, or due to network challenges.

Some Zimbabweans are also illegally outside the country in neighbouring countries while some applied for passports and left without collecting.

 Some have also not claimed their passports because they lost receipts.

In most cases a US$5 search fee is needed for those that lost receipts.

Mr Machiri said details of every applicant are captured in the system and no receipt will be needed from those that lost them once the names are publicised.

"So please I am begging citizens of Zimbabwe to come and collect their passports. They are yours and still valid, come collect them and use them to travel," said Mr Machiri.

"We are working on that and when we announce there won't be any need for those that lost receipts to pay a search fee. Even if you lost your receipt, come forward, our system is there and shows us when and where you applied and we will be there to assist."