NASSAU, Bahamas – Deputy Prime Minister and Minster of Foreign Affairs the Hon Brent Symonette is advising Bahamians whose passports are set to expire this year to apply for the ePassport to avoid the traditional summer rush at the Passport Office.
If a passport does not expire this year, the passport holder can still use the document for travelling even if he or she has already applied for the ePassport, Mr. Symonette said Monday.
Approximately 2,833 ePassports were completed in February 2009. Since the system was implemented in December 2007, an estimated 17,000 Bahamians have received the ePassport.
“Due to the increase usage of the ePassport, Bahamians are advised to go in. We want Bahamians to check their passports and if they are travelling in June or July, to go and apply for the ePassport and avoid the summer rush,” Mr. Symonette said.
He said the Passport Office will make the necessary adjustment to accommodate the expected high volume of applications, and to process them in a timely manner.
Those Bahamians whose passports expire after the summer are advised to apply for the ePassport towards the end of the year.
As of January, 2009, Passport Offices in Grand Bahama and Abaco began issuing the ePassport through the Passport Office in New Providence, which is the central printing station for all Bahamian ePassports.
Mr. Symonette said the Consulate General Office in Miami is being expanded to accommodate the volume of ePassport applications in that area.
The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), of which The Bahamas is a member, mandated that all countries issue the ePassport or Machine Readable Passports by 2010.
The ePassport was officially launched on December 5, 2007 in a move to increase protection against identity theft, heighten aviation security and combat illegal immigration.
‘The security of our identity and travel documents is of paramount importance to us. We
must ensure, therefore, that our passports and visas are resistant to fraudulent use, including the use of lost or stolen passports,” Mr. Symonette said.
The modern passport is being upgraded from a simple paper document to a more secure one – with biometrics features including facial characteristics and fingerprinting. Each passport holder is required to have a National Insurance Number in order to facilitate the new passport.
In 1994, the Government of The Bahamas began exploring the process of upgrading passports and other travel documents. On December 22, 2006 the Government signed a contract with Indusa Global, a Greenville, South Carolina-based information technology development and consulting firm, for an estimated $12.7 million to provide four systems to initiate the project.
The project included an ePassport issuance system, a Machine Readable Visa system, an E-Identification issuance system (smart cards for holders of work permits, spousal permits, home owners residence permits, permanent residence), and a Border Control Management System.
“By this initiative, The Bahamas will be ICAO compliant. We have had to and will undertake several actions and activities to facilitate our ePassport and Machine Readable visa initiative, and to ensure that our transition occurs as smoothly as possible,” Mr. Symonette said.
Additionally, a supporting Key Management System for the generation and management of digital security keys to protect and access the data stored in the passports and cards was also implemented. This system is used to add security to The Bahamas passport chips and smart cards, and forms the basis of authenticating the ePassport and e-Ids.
It is an integrated project involving the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Department of Immigration (Ministry of National Security), and the Data Processing Unit of the Ministry of Finance.
Mr Symonette meantime is urging Bahamians to keep their passports in a safe environment. He further advised that they photocopy the first four pages of the document, in the event it is lost or stolen. This would assist in processing a new passport.
