The strength of the Kenyan passport has been ranked ninth in Africa and 76th globally by the latest Henley Passport quarter three Index published on July 19.
Sadly, this is a drop from the previous ranking published earlier this year. Kenya had been ranked eighth alongside Tanzania in Africa and 71 globally.
Kenyans with a passport can only access 72 countries without a visa or obtain one upon arrival and need a visa to enter 127 travel destinations.
This number has not increased from the last report.
Henley Passport Index compares visa-free access of the 199 different passports globally, across 227 travel destinations.
However, most Kenyans do not understand what this means to those traveling outside the country.
The index ranks passports with no requirement for a visa as being strong, while it weakens as requirements for a visa increase.
“The index’s scoring system was developed to give users a nuanced, practical, and reliable overview of their passport’s power. Each passport is scored on the total number of destinations that the holder can access visa-free,” read part of the report.
Intending to curb increasing forgery and impersonation of passport holders, Kenya rolled out new chip-embedded passports.
The new features are meant to make it impossible for anyone to forge or duplicate a Kenyan passport.
This came following a directive from the Heads of States Summit that was meant to encourage free movement among citizens of the East African Community (EAC) which will boost development.
In Africa, Seychelles has the strongest passport that can access 153 destinations without a visa, it was ranked 28th globally. While Somalia was ranked 105 globally and can only access 35 travel destinations.
Globally, Japan was in the position with the strongest passport that can access 193 travel destinations without a visa. Afghanistan was ranked last with the weakest passport that can only access 27 travel destinations.
Source: kENYANS.CO.KE
