The Ministry of Internal Affairs has said that despite the expiry of old passports on April, 4, 2022, Ugandans abroad will be allowed to use them to return home.
Following the introduction of the new East African E-passport, government has mulled plans to have the old machine-readable passports phased out for the new ones.
The old passports will therefore expire on April, 4, 2022 but a number of Ugandans have not yet applied for the new East African E-passports.
However, in a statement released on Friday, the Director in charge of Citizenship and Immigration Control, Maj Gen Apollo Kasiita Gowa said Ugandans living abroad and are returning home will be allowed to use the old passports.
“The Ministry of Internal Affairs wishes to inform all Ugandans living in the diaspora that after the deadline of April, 4, 2022, machine- readable passports will only be by citizens returning to Uganda. They will not be used to travel to other countries,” Maj Gen Gowa said.
The announcement there means that whereas Ugandans will be allowed to use the old passports wherever they will be on journeys back home to Uganda, their passports will no longer be accepted while travelling back to those other countries where they stay, work or go for business.
The Internal Affairs Ministry however says these can apply for the new E-passports online at WWW.passports.go.ug as the deadline approaches.
Cost
An ordinary passport costs shs250,000 for normal application and can be issued in three working days whereas an express ordinary passport goes for shs400,000 to be issued in a day.
On the other hand, official passports go for shs400,000 and diplomatic passports go for shs500,000.