The United States has identified 19 African countries that will serve as regional visa-processing hubs under a proposed overhaul of its consular operations on the continent, a move that could significantly reshape how millions of Africans access U.S. visas.
According to an internal State Department memo cited by the Associated Press, Washington plans to reduce the number of embassies and consulates in Africa handling visa applications from 50 to just 20 processing locations.
The selected hubs are located in: Abidjan, Ivory Coast; Accra, Ghana; Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Cape Town, Johannesburg, South Africa; Dakar, Senegal; Dar-Es-Salaam, Tanzania; Djibouti, Djibouti; Kampala, Uganda; Kigali, Rwanda; Kinshasa, Congo.
Others include Lagos, Nigeria; Lome, Togo; Luanda, Angola; Malabo, Equatorial Guinea; Monrovia, Liberia; Nairobi, Kenya; Port Louis, Mauritius; Praia, Cape Verde; and Yaounde, Cameroon.
South Africa hosts two of the designated centers, in Cape Town and Johannesburg, bringing the total number of processing hubs to 20.
