South Sudan Embassy in Cairo - Courtesy

South Sudanese citizens living in Egypt can now apply for a new passport and receive it within a short period, an official in the embassy in Cairo has said.

Counselor Deng Gabriel says it will ease the burden on South Sudanese residing in Egypt.

He pointed out that it will only take the applicant a week to get the new passport.

Gabriel says in the past, it took applicants at least six months to get a passport from the embassy in Egypt.

According to the Counselor, the immigration department in the Embassy has now installed three machines to carry out the passport issuing procedures.

This step came after it was reported that many South Sudanese in Egypt face difficulties renewing their passports.

“In the previous period, we encountered some technical problems represented in the lack of passport booklets, which are not from the embassy, but from the passport administration in Juba,” Gabriel told Eye Radio.

“The embassy here in Cairo received three passport-issuing machines. Currently, the officer in charge will do the investigation and photographing.

“The data used to be sent to Juba, but now it has become centralized. Only printing is done in Juba, and this is a development in the process of speeding up procedures for the citizens.

“We will try hard to quickly retrieve the passport after printing from Juba. As for the citizens’ fear.

“The six-month period is long enough to complete the renewal, and we will provide the documents to everyone before the end of the period.”