The Directorate of Citizenship and Immigration Control (DCIC), under the Ministry of Internal Affairs, has announced plans to destroy more than 42,000 unclaimed passports, citing prolonged abandonment and logistical constraints in storage.
The passports, valued at approximately Shs10.5 billion, have remained uncollected by applicants for months, despite several attempts by the directorate to reach out to their owners through SMS reminders.
Speaking to journalists on Monday, Ministry of Internal Affairs spokesperson Mr. Simon Peter Mundeyi said this is not the first time the directorate is taking such action. He revealed that last year, over 62,000 passports worth Shs15.5 billion were similarly destroyed after sitting unclaimed for an extended period.
“Despite repeated SMS reminders, many Ugandans do not return to collect their passports,” Mr. Mundeyi said. “We are now sitting on another 42,000 unclaimed passports and are left with no choice but to dispose of them. We urge applicants to come and collect them before we proceed with destruction.”
The vast majority of the passports, over 97 percent, are ordinary travel documents, each costing Shs250,000. The remaining few include service and diplomatic passports, which are issued to specific categories of individuals under government or official duties.
Mr. Mundeyi attributed the large number of unclaimed documents to multiple factors, including misleading promises made to Ugandan job seekers by both genuine and fraudulent labour recruitment agencies. He noted that many passport applicants were enticed with the prospect of job placements abroad, especially in Gulf countries.
However, a significant drop in follow-through occurred after Saudi Arabia, one of the top destinations for Ugandan migrant workers, temporarily suspended labour recruitment from Uganda. The suspension, announced last year, aimed to curb rising cases of human trafficking and to streamline recruitment practices, which had become increasingly riddled with irregularities.
“After the Saudi suspension, many applicants simply abandoned the process. They had obtained passports in anticipation of travel, but with the job offers falling through, they lost interest in collecting the documents,” Mundeyi explained.
The DCIC has since been grappling with a growing backlog in passport storage, which not only creates logistical pressure on facilities but also poses a financial loss to the government.
Mr. Mundeyi encouraged citizens who applied for passports to follow up on their applications through the online tracking system or by visiting passport issuance centres in Kampala and regional offices.
“If you applied and completed the process, check your status. The passport may already be waiting for you,” he said.
The DCIC has not disclosed an exact date for the planned destruction exercise but maintains that the process will commence soon unless the documents are claimed.
The warning comes amid broader efforts by the Ministry of Internal Affairs to streamline the passport issuance process, which has in recent years undergone digitization to reduce congestion and speed up processing.
As Uganda prepares for increased labour migration once bilateral agreements resume, authorities are urging applicants to take passport collection seriously to avoid avoidable losses and delays.
Source: UG Exclusive