By Assan Bah
Minister of Interior Abdoulie Sanyang has warned against the levying of laissez-passer on non-Gambians, emphasising that laissez-passer should be issued free of charge as stated under the Gambia’s Immigration law.
Minister Sanyang said this last week Wednesday, 2 July while responding to Honourable Nfamara Sabally, National Assembly Member (NAM) for Wuli West Constituency, who enquired whether there are any costs attached to laissez-passer and how much, if there is any.
“Honourable Speaker, May I inform this August assembly that the visiting pass, commonly known as ‘laissez-passer’ is issued free of charge by the Gambia Immigration Department in accordance with section 7, subsection 1, sub 2 of the Immigration Act, Cap 1602,” he reported.
A ‘laissez-passer’ serves as a temporary travel document for individuals without valid passport or ID in monitoring movement at borders for national security reasons.
He indicated to the Minister that some immigration officers collect money from passengers, alleging that these officers have their own receipts without serial numbers.
“They force people to buy it for D50,” he alleged, urging the Minister to make further investigation on the matter.
Hon. Fatou Cham, NAM for SaniMentereng Constituency, reminded the Minister that members of ECOWAS should not pay anything to enter a particular area within the ECOWAS countries.
“As alluded to in the questionnaire, that immigration officers do ask for D50 for the laissez-passer. Are you willing to engage the Immigration Department to make sure that this stops with immediate effect as it has no connection with the law of the country,” she asked.
“I’m not only willing, I’m going to instruct them not to do so. So we’ll give that instruction and we’ll also follow the monitoring and supervision,” he stressed.
Hon. Lamin Ceesay, who read a question on behalf of Hon. Almameh Gibba of Foni Kansala, for an update on the current status of the Immigration Bill, clarifying the reasons for the delay.
The Minister responded that all necessary revisions and insertions have been made for the final submission of the document to Cabinet.
“The Gambia Immigration Service Bill 2023 consists of both the current Immigration Act of 1965 and the smuggling of Migrants Bill of 2019,” Minister Sanyang said.
“The drafting and review of the GIS Bill 2024 require a profound expert and stakeholder review before its validation. Furthermore, following the validation exercise, the senior management of the Gambia Immigration Department, JIT, together with the Ministry’s senior management team under my leadership, conducted a comprehensive review of the Bill.”
He, however, clarified that there was delay to the Bill, promising that the Bill was due for submission to cabinet latest this week.
“What we need to do is to be able to take this thing to Cabinet. Because before you take a Bill to Cabinet, you yourself need to understand the Bill.
“They need to do the review. And we have about seven sessions, and then last week we finalised it and then we are submitting it to Cabinet, possibly this week or next week,” he said.
In another question, the NAM for Sabach Sanjal, Hon. Alhagie Babou Ceesay, asked for the statistics of non-Gambians deported from January, 2023 to December, 2024 and the reasons for their deportation.
“The deportation of non-Gambians from January, 2023 to December, 2024 stands at 84, out of which 20 were in 2023 and 64 in 2024,” he revealed, adding: “These individuals, primarily from sub-Saharan African countries, were deported either by the court or for committing immigration-related offences.”
