Devolution Agenda Bears Fruit: E-Passport Office For Chipinge District

CHIPINGE-On numerous occasions, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has
spoken against the centralisation of services and activities in metropolitan
provinces, cities and towns at the expense of rural areas.
This call has formed part of the President’s mantra that ‘no one and no place
should be left behind’ in the country’s development drive.
It is against this backdrop the civil registry department is set to take the e-
passport to Chipinge in Manicaland Province as the Government works to
decentralise critical services.
The Government recently began plans to establish a one-stop registry centre in
Chipinge, which will see an e-passport office being set up in the town.
Manicaland Provincial Registrar, Joyce Munamati said the Government had
already engaged a contractor to work on the project which is expected to take
off this month.
“This programme is about the Government finalising plans to establish an e-
passport service in Chipinge. Chipinge has pioneered this service in Manicaland
and we believe this is going to serve so many people,” she said.
The development is part of the government’s 100-day cycle projects.
“The project is feeding into the 100-day programme in the department and also
into NDS1 where the government is fulfilling its mantra of leaving no one and
no place in development issues. As you can see the e-passport is being launched
deep down and far away from the city centres,” said Munamati.
Chipinge District Development Coordinator, William Mashava welcomed the
development and took the opportunity to inform residents that registry services
will still be available while the e-passport office is being set up.
“As Chipinge district we welcome this development. We want to assure our
people that normal registry services will continue to be offered while

renovations for the e-passport are being made. This will ensure that Chipinge
will be a one-stop registry service centre,” said Mashava.
Nearby districts in the province including Chimanimani and Buhera will also be
served at the offices.
As such, there will be no need for the residents to visit the provincial capital,
Mutare, for passport services.
Zimbabwe now has e-passport offices in nine of the country’s 10 provinces,
with Masvingo being the next in line.
Other centres where Zimbabweans are currently accessing the e-passports are
Gweru, Beitbridge, Lupane, Hwange, Bulawayo, Murewa, Chitungwiza, Harare
and Marondera.
For many years, Zimbabweans struggled to obtain passports and the turnaround
time for getting the documents could be as long as one year. However, it is now
just down to a maximum of seven days, underlining the strides made by the
Second Republic to make national documents accessible to citizens.
Making passports and other national documents easily accessible to the people
is a citizens’ right enshrined in the Constitution.
The documents are fundamental to individuals as they provide citizens with
rights to participate in the economic, political and social development of a
country.