..and the Director of Passports Wept....

THE DIRECTOR of Passports, Mr. Kwesi Quartey, yesterday wept uncontrollably and for several minutes could not hold back his tears when ?The Chronicle? stormed his offices to make enquiries about the passport scandal that has rocked his outfit.

Confirming media reports that there were series of scandals in the office, he told this paper that the current system of passport acquisition was so porous, outdated and fraud-filled that some unscrupulous officers might be conniving with the so-called ?passport contractors? and taking advantage of the loopholes in the system to carry out fraudulent deals.

Mr. Quartey also disclosed that the main architect behind a number of passport scandals that had rocked his outfit, was one Idrisu, who was an employee of the National Security Council (NSC).

According to the passport director, when he was appointed in November 2004, his predecessor had initiated Information Communication and Technology (ICT) system to curb the problem of racketeering in the system.

He added that the need to provide security due to the emergence of international terrorism and all sorts of international scams perpetrated by other nationals in the name of Ghana.

He disclosed that such a consideration had led to the award of a multi-million Pound Sterling contract to Buck Press Limited, a Ghanaian printing company, in 2004, to start the printing of the new computerized, ICT passports in 2005, after it was approved by the castle.

However, Mr. Quartey disclosed that after the contract was awarded to Buck Press Ltd, one of the contractors that participated in the bidding process, IKAM Printing Press, which was currently in charge of printing the existing passports, petitioned the tender committee, complaining of an unfair deal.

He said IKAM?s petition to the tender committee, led the Ministry of Finance to pull the plug on the implementation of the new system.

Mr. Quartey told the Chronicle that he was devastated by the article, which tried to implicate him as the one behind the deal. ?My friend, I have worked for 30 years for this country and I have never taken any money from anybody to carry out my responsibility as a diplomat, Civil Servant and a director.?

He continued, ?This article has grinded my career to a halt, after 30 years of hard work at the Ministry Foreign Affairs as the Head of Legal Department, Deputy Permanent Representative, Permanent Mission of Ghana to the United Nations and just a year as the director of passport, my hard-won reputation has been completely destroyed.?

Mr. Quartey explained that to acquire a passport in Ghana now, all a person needed to do was to complete a passport application form, a birthday certificate, a recommendation or cover letter and four passport-sized pictures.

But the tear-filled director asserted that birthday certificates and recommendation letters from educational institutions and companies were forged all over the country. He conceded that the current system of passport acquisition had no mechanism to detect the authenticity of these ?forged documents that are usually attached to application forms. He added that the system could not even check multiple acquisitions of passports by detecting it through applicants with similar pictures or names, thereby discouraging people from acquiring more than one passport.

Commenting on the Crusading Guide?s story of yesterday, Quartey denied categorically that he was the signatory to the alleged passports acquired by Anas Aremeyaw Anas.

He claimed that it was wrong for the young man to acquire them by deliberately using such names as Agyakum Kuffuor, attached with Mr. B.A Mensah?s picture, with another picture attached to the name of Zakaria Aliu Mahama.

He revealed that the said passports were signed by one of his deputies, Mr. Mintah Acheapong Agyemang, adding that the president is not the only person called Agyekum Kufuor, while the vice president is not the only Aliu Mahama in the country.

According to him, his deputy, Mr. Agyemang, might have never seen Mr. B.A. Mensah in his life in order to be able to establish his identity through his picture.

In addition, Mr. Quartey stated that there were no letters of recommendation from the office of the president and the vice president to indicate that they wanted to acquire passports so that his deputy to check for their authenticity through the passport pictures.

The weeping Quartey disclosed that the passport office worked in corroboration with a number of state security agencies such as BNI, NSC, Immigration Service, CID and Police Service, who were mandated to play the role of checking on criminals from other countries who wanted to acquire Ghanaian passports.

He said there had been reports in other media networks, which had indicated that Nigerians especially, were acquiring Ghanaian passports, but added that again these ?criminals? were using Ghanaian names and under no circumstance could one identify them through their pictures.

Mr. Quartey, who could not hold back his tears, maintained that he was worried because if the new system had kicked off in 2005, there wouldn?t have been any passport scandal or a newspaper article to destroy his hard-won reputation.

In his conclusion, Mr. Quartey said he welcomed the investigations and prayed that the exposure by the Crusading Guide Newspaper would help to cleanse the system once and for all for a more secured passport for all Ghanaians.