Moshi, the United Republic of Tanzania - IOM Côte d'Ivoire, with the technical support of the International Organization for Migrations (IOM) African Capacity Building Centre (ACBC) in Moshi, conducted 10 days Training of Trainers (ToT) on travel documents examination and fraud detection to Government officials from Ministries of Security and Civil Protection, Territorial  Administration and Decentralization of Côte d'Ivoire.

The ToT which has mainly targeted police and immigration officers aimed at strengthening their capacity to examine, intercept, and detect fraudulent documents with the aim of efficiently and effectively combatting irregular migration, human trafficking, human smuggling as well as other cross-border crimes.

This training is a complementary component of a technical support package provided by IOM to officials from the Directorate of Monitoring of Territories (DMT) from Côte d'Ivoire.

The ToT participants who were 10 in number, were particularly pleased with the knowledge and skills that they have acquired from training.

Dr. Lagbré Appolinaire, one of the training participants from the Ivorian Ministry of Security and Civil Protection noted that, the content of the training is of very high importance for his country and reassured that they will make good use of it once back home.  "Fraudulent travel documents represent the first weapon for terrorists, human smugglers and traffickers, therefore the knowledge and the skills that we acquired from this training will positively contribute in our know-how in our efforts to prevent them”.  

Mr. Michel Bugugu, a Congolese Expert and a certified trainer by IOM ACBC who facilitated the ToT said, "It is an honor for me to facilitate this training as it has provided me with the opportunity to exchange both knowledge and experience on a very important subject i.e. passports examination with Ivorian colleagues which I believe will positively contribute in their capacity in detecting of fraudulent documents."

Dr Qasim Sufi, IOM Chief of Mission in the United Republic of Tanzania and co-supervisor of the ACBC, welcomes this training to the Ivorian authorities. Indeed, IOM ACBC has not only produced global training tools in the field of Immigration and Border Management (IBM), such as the Passport Examination Procedure Manual (PEPM2) used during this training, the Document Examination Laboratory for the Immigration Environment Manual (DELMIE) and the PEPM Application (PEPM App) for the verification of electronic passports (chip) and facial recognition, but the Centre has created a pool of African trainers like M. Bugugu, who are able to conduct trainings in the four main languages spoken in Africa, namely Arabic, English, French, Kiswahili and Portuguese.

This month, IOM ACBC simultaneously conducted activities across the continent including this training in Moshi. The other three took place in Northern Africa (Egypt), Southern Africa (Union of the Comoros) and West Africa (Gambia).

Funded by the Government of Japan, this capacity-building project is helping Côte d'Ivoire in strengthening its operational and strategic capabilities in managing its border efficiently and effectively and as the result increasing the security of its sensitive border areas through dialogue, social cohesion and trust-building between the authorities and communities.

To read the french version, click here.