Last month, Emirates announced that from 1 February 2012 they will start flying into Harare from Dubai via Zambia 5 times a week. EK713 will depart from Dubai every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday at 09:25am and arrive in Harare at 5:20pm with the return flight leaving Harare at 7:20pm. This is the first major airline after the withdrawal of services from other foreign airlines that will take to the Zimbabwean skies. This news will come as a welcome relief for the travelling public with the increase in choice they will bring.

In years gone by, there have been reports of the government refusing to approve requests from various foreign carriers to service the nation. Some of these airlines once flew to Zimbabwe but for one reason or another, the powers that be did not accommodate their requests. With the entry of Emirates into the market, some questions come to mind.

The first that comes to mind being, could this mean that the government may be a bit more receptive to other carriers looking to enter or re-enter Zimbabwe? Having airlines such British Airways (long-haul direct from London), Qantas, Lufthansa, Air France and KLM just to name a few flying to Zimbabwe again offering choice and bringing in much needed tourist dollars. The Tourists dollars will hopefully go towards rebuilding Zimbabwe.

A second question that comes to mind is what it will mean for Air Zimbabwe and how the national airline will react? Over the past few months and even extending into years, Air Zimbabwe has been facing crisis after crisis such as debts running into the hundreds of millions as well as strike action by pilots and cabin crew. All of this as well as an aging fleet have impeded its service delivery and may be a cause for concern.

Emirates is a well oiled machine and has been rated as one of the top ten airlines in the world (Skytrax). They fly a modern fleet of over 100 aircraft (with many more on order) to just about every part of the world at very competitive prices. Consumers may be more inclined to choose Emirates over Air Zimbabwe, which could spell even more trouble for them. But, this development may inadvertently force Air Zimbabwe to implement chances that get it on track to being a formidable competitor.

The following is comment left by a reader in response to “Applying For A Zimbabwean Passport Without An I.D. Card?“

I post this only to try and help anyone about to go through this same ordeal…..this is from our hands-on experience. This is advice only, maybe each experience is different. One other word – keep your cool in Makombe building – I saw some outbursts, and they ended up with back-of-the-queue results, just fyi.

We live in the Middle East. We had to go back to Zim to renew my wife’s passport – she was originally born in Harare, of South African-born parents. We spent 3 weeks back in Zim in July 2011, dedicated only to sort her pp out.
Took 10 long visits to Makombe Building at least. I will reserve comments on the state of the building or attitude of its employees. Suffice to say that the requirements stated above are basically correct from our experience , but the actual experience is not so basic, and we experienced it as follows:

Long Birth Certificate – essential.

National Identity Card (Driver’s Licence Not Accepted). They will accept the green paper instead of the metal ID but you should have a photo attached with the ID number in the original photo.

For Women, Marriage Certificate/National Identity Card in Married Name/Divorce Order

Two Passport Colour Photographs (Size 3.5 x 4.5cm) (this is like the last step)

Citizenship Certificate (For Citizens by Registration)
THIS TOOK THE LONGEST TIME TO GET IN THE WHOLE PROCESS – IF YOU DON’T HAVE IT, AND HAVE PARENTS OF FOREIGN CITIZENSHIP AT THE TIME OF YOUR BIRTH REGISTRATION (it shows your parents nationality on your long birth certificate, hence the reason why you need the long one…), THEN BE PREPARED FOR THE RESPONSE THAT IT WILL TAKE 6 MONTHS and maybe it will (it took 2 weeks for us, but then I was very resilient, persistent, but always showing respect etc), unless you open every door in Makombe building and happen to meet someone who can help compress the timelines…..). don’t give up! IF YOU ARE OF FOREIGN DESCENT, YOU NEED TO GET COPIES (non-certified is ok) OF BOTH, I MEAN BOTH, OF YOUR PARENTS BIRTH CERTIFICATES AND FOREIGN I.D.s (I questioned this at length, but no logic was evident – seems you have to PROVE that your parents are foreign, which is actually why you are having to go through this crap in the first place….). By the way, for a very quick Comm of Oaths service, there is a very pleasant chap in Borrowdale (opp. TM over the road, part of the Car sales place – take the back entrance) who does instant certification for 1 US$ per doc, or 4 US$ for the swearing in of the Renunciation document). Oh, and once you get your fingerprints done (right outside the office number 100 where you make the first citizenship application) you have to take the form to be signed by a Police Station – try Milton Park, it is the closest, pay for the US$ 10 option (URGENT), not the US$5 option, but be prepared to wait for the Police lady to stamp & sign the forms…..

Old Passport or Emergency Travel Documents If Any….when we eventually collected the new passport, we HAD to show them the old one – then, the lady at ‘the window’ just put 2 lines through the first page and handed it back….

Letter on Citizenship Status from the country you have lived in for 5 years and more
WE DIDNT NEED THIS, BUT WE HAD TO RENOUNCE HER FOREIGN HERITAGE AT THE SOUTH AFRICAN EMBASSY AS PART OF THE RENUNCIATION PROCESS (Very quick, and free at the SA embassy, they give you back a letter in 15 mins, kudos to them) BUT, AS I SAID ABOVE, THE MISSION IS TO GET THE ZIM CIT CERTIFICATE FIRST. And make like 3 CERTIFIED copies of all your documents, because they will ask for them at some point….

There is probably more detail, but just be prepared, have all your ZIM ID, Birth certs (long form), copy passports etc ready to roll. Oh, and for the ‘official’ 24 hour final passport processing, it costs US $ 318. But, it is not done in 24 hrs necessarily, could be a week or so.

Good luck, it is a crazy process, and keep the faith.

We recently received an email from an individual concerned about the validity of Zimbabwean passports issued by the Registrar General’s Passport Office. As per the email below, a friend of the individual was arrested and sentenced for being in possession of a fraudulent passport:

A number of people have fallen victim to passport counterfeiters working within the Registrar General’s Office and unknowingly travelled using this documentation. As can be seen from above, this can cause a few issues for the innocent travelling public. That being said, does anyone have answers to the questions asked in the email?

1. How can people verify the authenticity of a Zimbabwean passport?
2. How can individuals charged with unknowingly obtaining a false passport prove their innocence?

If you know the answers to these questions, please post them in the comments section below.

A number of people have emailed us questions related to applying for a new Zimbabwean passport from the diaspora. One question that comes up frequently is that of the need for a Zimbabwe National ID Card when applying for a passport as per the example below:

We got in touch with two Zimbabwean Consulates (one in the Asia Pacific region and the other in Europe) to find out if it was possible to apply for a new Zimbabwean passport without a National ID card. The response from both of them was that a passport application will not be processed without an identity card.

All of the following documents and photocopies are required to be produced in person in order to process a passport application:

This situation can leave people who have lost their passports and are trying to apply for a renewal in what feels like a catch 22. This is because identity cards are only issued in Zimbabwe where registrants have to appear in person in order to get their photos and fingerprints taken.

If you happen to be in a situation like this where you need a new passport but don’t have an I.D. card, the next best thing would be to apply for an emergency travel document and make your way to Zimbabwe and apply for the necessary documents.

It has been reported that the Home Affairs co-minister Theresa Makone is set to investigate alleged corruption at the Registrar General’s Passport Office. This includes paying for passports at inflated prices and/or having to pay in order to be served.

The minister went on to say that she was not aware of such practises which is absolute rubbish! It is a known fact that in order to get served in a timely manner or even get served at all in government departments you have to be prepared to part with money to get service.

Even though corruption in itself is bad enough, it is the least of people’s worries when it comes to dealing with the passport office. After spending all of that hard earned money of yours to get a travel document you could end up with a fraudulent travel document. Being in possession of a fake Zimbabwean passport or emergency travel document could get you into more trouble and stress than you bargained for (The consequences of being stopped with a fake travel document in or out of Zimbabwe can be left to your imagination).

This is a Zimbabwe passport applicant BEWARE warning. Having to pay corrupt officials is the least of your worries. You need to be sure that you are getting a genuine document.

Below is an image of the details page of a fraudulent Zimbabwean passport [sensitive information has been removed]. Can you spot any differences?

(click on image for large view)

Post idea and image of fraudulent document supplied by an anonymous contributor. Contribute to Living Zimbabwe.

The structure below is one that you are driving to and from the Harare International Airport. Years ago it used to be guarded by military personnel, nowadays there are a couple to security guards who don’t seem too interested in what they are doing. This stretch of road was also a popular road block point for police or Zimra (Zimbabwe Revenue Authority) trying to catch out people coming off international flights and had managed to evade their counterparts at the customs lanes.

What does the monument mean to you?

One thing that you will be hard pressed to not find on the streets of Harare are potholes. Some roads are good with only one or two potholes here and there whilst others are really bad to the point where no matter what you do, you wont be able to avoid them (click on images for larger view).

When looking at and thinking about the state of the roads the notion of thinking about where to start fixing them is overwhelming! Surprisingly enough though, earlier in the year, it looked like strides were being made to get the roads back to an acceptable and safe standard. After driving down roads on a regular basis, you get to know where all the potholes are and how to avoid them but some potholes on various roads were being filled in with tar and the funny thing is that it felt odd to be driving down them and not have to play the game of dodging potholes.

Before then, some people took it upon themselves to try and improve the conditions of certain stretches of road by filling the potholes with concrete or ruble. This was only probably being done because it may have been the road that they live on or use on a regular basis and have a vested interest in the longevity of their vehicles. People who have been unlucky enough to hit a pothole hard enough have come off second best with two flat tyres, cracked rims, cracked suspensions and the list goes on.

Some people have gone as far as trying to capitalize on the situation to try and make a few dollars. One such scenario was when two men took it upon themselves to fill a relatively big pothole in the middle of a busy road. The pair worked away breaking bricks with metal poles with home made cardboard signs on either side of them that read something along the lines of ‘filling potholes voluntarily and donations of $1 or 50c are kindly accepted’. I didn’t see anyone stop to make a donation.

It is going to take a lot to get the roads of Zimbabwe back to an acceptable and safe condition. In the meanwhile it is going to continue to cost vehicle owners a fair amount of money as they try to keep up with repairing damage caused by potholes.

To be frank, the Registrar-General’s Makombe building passport office experience was a ‘bitch’! Hoards of people, queues that at first didn’t make sense, civil servants full of attitude, soaring summer time temperatures, irritable applicants and the list goes on.

When I first went over there to check what the price of a new passport was, it did not make much sense at all to me as to where to start off with the application process. There were queues and groups of people all over the place. One to pay for the application form and application fee, another to get this checked on the form after you have filled it out, another to get that checked on the form after you have gotten ‘this’ checked and another to submit the application after this and that has been checked. After that, depending on what type of application you put in, you return in 1, 3 or 14 days to collect you brand spanking new Zimbabwean Passport or ETD which you hope is not fake (we will get into that in another post).

One thing that you should expect though is to not get you passport in the 1, 3 or 14 days. I have personally come across people who have put in applications for 24 hour passports at the start of one week and when they have gone back the next day to pick it up, they have been told to return the following week.

It is not fun to be lining up outside at the height of summer to get your hands on an application form. You would think that it would be a bit more bearable once you get into the building but that is not the case. In the corridors you will find queues or people lining up to get into various rooms. There is no ventilation and it can be almost impossible to pass through various sections unless you literally push people out of your way in order to get through. All of that leads to tempers flaring with a few words being exchanged and on a couple of occasion fists being exchanged so you best be careful what you do and say.

If you do not want to be driven completely insane, the best thing to do is to something that ever since way back when has always been done, get a hold of someone who works in the office and ask them to assist you. Their assistance will see you jump queues (maybe not all of them) and avoid the stress of pushing and shoving with people all day long to get the application through. For some it can be a very stressful experience and if you pay the office a visit, do not be surprised if you find someone in tears and not knowing what to do.

It is extremely irritating for some to go through the hassles of trying to get a passport given that if you are a Citizen of Zimbabwe you have every right to have a passport and the process of getting one should not be as complicated and stressful as it is. Some put it down to not only beaurocracy but to the civil servants working in these and other government departments seeing themselves as being in a position of power where they can and may very well make life hell unless they are compensated accordingly. Who is to blame for this corruption and exploitation? Is the government, the civil servants or has society just taken up that frame of mind?

For those of you who have not been to Zimbabwe for a while, here is footage of what you can expect to see when landing at Harare International Airport in mid November. The footage was taken from a South African Airways Boeing 737-800 flight from O.R. Tambo International Airport, Johannesburg.