Member of Parliament for the Asante Akim North constituency and Chairman of Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Andy Appiah-Kubi, has said that passports are no longer a source document to prove one’s citizenship since the inception of the Ghana Card.
His comments follow the astronomical increase in passport processing fees by Parliament, which came into effect on Monday, April 1, 2024.
He said passport is now a “privilege” document for those who want to travel.
He, therefore, questioned why taxpayers’ money should be spent on subsidising passport application fees for the few who want to “enjoy the privilege of travelling” at the expense of those who intend not to travel, stressing that the acquisition of a passport is a privilege.
The Asante Akim North legislator, in an interview on The Key Points on Saturday, April 6, argued that Ghanaians pay about $200 non-refundable visa application fees yet complain about paying GHC500 to secure a 10-year travel document.
“So those of us who are going to use our monies to support those people are not also the people of Ghana?” he quizzed, adding, “In any case, the people who want to travel, it is the privilege they want to enjoy. Why should I, who will not enjoy that privilege, be the person to be paying?
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He continued that “passports become necessary when people want to travel. Before the passage of the L.I., people were paying GHC100 for a GHC400 product, and the state of Ghana was subsidising using Ghana’s money.”
Responding to whether the House represented the views and concerns of the Ghanaian people in approving the over 500 percent increment of the document, he said, “Passport is not a requirement for you to prove your citizenship because now it is the national identification card that citizens use in proving citizenship.”
He also described as “propaganda” the assertions that Ghanaians are complaining about the new fees.
According to him, Ghanaians who complain about paying GHC500 for a passport end up paying between $1000 and $2000 for a plane ticket to travel.