Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda will
from Tuesday July 15 start using interstate passes for travel under the
Coalition of the Willing (CoW) measures meant to expedite integration.
The certificates of identity will
phase out the use of coupons as travel documents for movement within the EAC
and will be issued by local immigration authorities.
Interstate passes were previously
issued to citizens for emergency travel for which a passport could not be
issued, with the coupons acting as visas because national identity cards have
no provision for immigration stamps.
Early this year, the three
governments launched the use of national identity cards, student and voter
cards as travel documents.
During their sixth Northern
Corridor Integration Projects Summit held in Kigali recently, the three heads
of state, Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya and Paul Kagame of
Rwanda directed that in order to ensure the efficient use of national IDs as
travel documents between the three partners, the heads of immigration should
ensure implementation of the procedure manual on the use of ID or
Voters’/Student Cards. Uganda and Kenya were directed to customize the Personal
Identification Secure Comparison and Evaluation System to read the IDs by
September 1. Only Rwanda uses the machine readable and electronic national
identity cards.
In the EAC, only Rwanda and Kenya
issue national identity cards. Uganda and Tanzania are in the process of
issuing their national identity cards as an EAC requirement.
The three countries have agreed
to use machine readable and electronic ID as travel documents for nationals who
wish to travel across the three countries.
The Common Market Protocol
provides for the use of machine – readable national IDs for travel within the
EASC, but only for citizens of partner states that have accepted their use.
East African citizens will not need a passport or visa to travel to the
three member states.