Africa-Press – Gambia. The Immigration Department has sent a team of officers to Mauritania to issue national identity cards to ‘undocumented’ Gambians, Director General Ebrima Mboob told.
He said the move is in response to a request by the Gambian Embassy in Mauritania “exclusively for the protection of Gambian citizens who are undocumented and risk getting deported from that country”.
“This move is prompted by the insecurity situation in and around Mauritania where aliens who fail to regularise their status would be subject to repatriation and deportation. We have a large number of Gambians residing in Mauritania and some of them are students. So, the embassy reached out to us to look into it and we responded to dispatch a team to Mauritania,” DG Mboob explained, adding that it has to be understood too that Mauritania is not part of Ecowas.
Mbood disclosed that this will also be the first time Gambians will be issued ID cards outside the country which is a new development for the Gambia Immigration Department.
Asked how this would be done, DG Mboob explained that processing will be done through mobile enrollment. “We are talking of digitising GID services. Passports will be decentralised and Gambians in the diaspora will be issued and ID cards will be provided to the people wherever it is requested even outside the Gambia,” he said.
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