Can a US citizen get a visa at the airport in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso?

John Marquiss, Sara Yamaka, and I are traveling to Burkina Faso to see John’s friend who works in the Peace Corps and to attend the SIAO, Salon International de l’artisanat de Ouagadougou, The International Arts and Crafts Fair in Ouagadougou.

These are the steps that John and I had to look into in order to get this one question answered.

This is what the SIAO website says about obtaining visas:
International visitors are encouraged to check passport and visa regulations according to their nationality. Information can be obtained from Burkina Faso embassies or consulates in your country, or from your travel professional.

I checked the US State Department website to see if we needed visas. This is what it says: *Passport and visa required. Multiple entry visas, valid up to 3 months ($75 fee) or 6 months ($100 fee), require appropriate fee, 2 application forms, and 2 photos. Proof of compulsory yellow fever immunization needed and cholera vaccination recommended. For more information, call the Embassy of Burkina Faso, 2340 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Washington, DC 20008 (202/332-5577) or Honorary Consulate in Los Angeles, CA (213/575-5567) or New Orleans, LA (504/284-6351).

I called the Embassy of Burkina Faso in Washington DC. They said that I could NOT get a visa at the airport. They told me I would need to go to the closest embassy and apply for a visa. Qatar does not have an Embassy of Burkina Faso. The closest Embassy of Burkina Faso is in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. If you are Muslim and going to Mecca or Medina, then you can get a visa to get into Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia does not offer tourist visas. They have a transit visa valid for seven days. John and tried to get one of those once. It took us two months and we were denied a visa because of new rules Qatar had enacted about leased vehicles going into Saudi Arabia. Even if we got a transit visa, and the Burkina Faso visa process would have taken more than seven days, we would have been stuck illegally in Saudi Arabia without visas and unable to get back to Qatar.

According to the “Get In” section of the Wikitravel entry for Burkina Faso, you can purchase a visa upon arrival. Here is what it says in “Get In”:
Passport and a visa are required to enter the country. You generally should purchase your visa in advance, although with 10,000 CFA currency a visa can be purchased at the airport upon arrival.

Also, according to the Lonely Planet postcards section which is a section of their website
where tips sent in by readers:
Visas, Embassies & Border Crossings
If you're a citizen of the European Community you can apply for a tourist visa when arriving at Ouagadougou airport. The procedure is very easy; you just need to fill in the forms (three pages) given to you by an officer, take one photo and pay CFA10,000 in local currency (there is an exchange bureau in the same airport). The officers won't issue the visa until the next day, so you should leave the passport and pick it up the next morning at the same airport. Don't worry about being without ID because the police will issue an authorisation instead. Judith Ripoll, Spain (Jun 03)
Make sure you organise your visa for Burkina Faso for your entire stay before you leave home. Burkina doesn't have an embassy in the Netherlands. The embassy in Brussels requires you to come and pick it up yourself, so we only got a 10-day visa from the French consulate for Burkina. Getting a new visa in Ouaga was slow and inefficient. We had to come back the next working day at 7am and could pick it up after 2pm in the afternoon. The attitude was very lazy and tourist unfriendly. Michiel Hillenius & Sonja Munnix, Netherlands (Feb 03)
Burkina Faso visa: obtained in the French Embassy in Lomè, Togo. I got a transit visa for 5 days for US$10. It was ready in 2 days. The cost of a one month visa is US$26. Patrizio Luntini, Italy (Feb 03)

According to this information, we may be able to get the visa at the airport (but being Americans, we are not citizens of the European Community) or we can get a visa at the French embassy in Doha Qatar.

I sent an email to the US Embassy in Burkina Faso asking for their advice. This is my email:

I am planning a tourism trip to Burkina Faso. I am a US citizen. I am currently living and working in the Middle Eastern country of Qatar. Qatar does not have an embassy for Burkina Faso. How can I obtain a visa to visit Burkina Faso? I am not able to safely send my passport to the Burkina Faso embassy in the US.Are visas available at the airport in Ouagadougou?Sincerely,
Ed Keller

This is the email message I received as a response:

Dear Sir,

I have been instructed by H.E. the Ambassador to inform you that you can obtain an entry visa at the Airport of Ouagadougou if you are invited by the SIAO.
Sincerely,
Office of the Ambassador

The Office of the Ambassador email didn’t give a straight answer the question of whether we could get a visa at the airport and it also added an extra step to enabling us to get a visa. We need to be invited by the SIAO. Now the interesting thing is that I never mentioned the SIAO in my email. The SIAO is the artisan fair we plan to go to and probably the only reason the US embassy thinks US citizens would want to come to Burkina Faso OR Big Brother (i.e. the US government or its spies) is watching me. HAHA Just kidding…is this mic on??? I love the US…”Oh, say can you seeeee…”

We are planning to go through Morocco for two days. There is an Embassy of Burkina Faso. I asked John to call the Embassy of Burkina Faso. When he called the person spoke French. Being ex-French colonial country, Burkina Faso’s official language is French. John does not speak French, so he asked Mark, one of the students in the Introductory French class, to speak French for him. Mark wanted Nadim to speak French for John. Nadim said he wouldn’t do it. Nadim told Mark what to say and Mark repeated it to the embassy person. This is the background as to why we called the Embassy of Burkina Faso. We are going to Morocco from Friday night to Sunday night. Morocco, even though it is a predominantly Muslim country operates on a Monday through Friday work week, unlike Qatar which is a Muslim country that has a Sunday through Thursday work week. In the Islamic religion Friday is a holy day. Basically, when Mark asked the person at the Embassy of Burkina Faso was whether they were open on Saturday or Sunday in order to apply for a visa. The answer was “NO.”

In the Lonely Planet postcard section, there is mention that French embassies can issue visa for Burkina Faso. I tried calling the French embassy in Qatar and got “Press one for…, Press two for …, Press three for…” When I finally got a real person on the phone I asked if the French embassy issued visas for Burkina Faso. The person told me to call another number for this information. I hung up the phone and dialed the new number. When the phone picked up the voice on the other side of the phone said “Press one for…, Press two for …, Press three for…”

I was a little frustrated so I had John call the French embassy. He finally got to speak to a real person after going through the same phone system I did. When he got the French embassy employee on the phone, John asked “Parlez-vous anglais?” The person said in English “YES.” So John asked the person if we could get visas for Burkina Faso at the French embassy. The person on the other end of the phone asked John to call another number for that information. John hung up the phone and dialed the new number. When the phone picked up the voice on the other side of the phone said “Press one for…, Press two for …, Press three for…”

John and I decided to go down to the visa section of the French embassy and find out for ourselves. We got to the French embassy. John asked the guard at the front gate if we could get visas for Burkina Faso at the embassy. He said “NO.” John asked if we could speak to someone in the visa section of the embassy. The visa section by the way is only open 8:30am-10:30am Sunday through Thursday to apply for visas. If you get stuck in traffic in Doha, you will miss the window of opportunity. The guard called someone at the visa section and asked if we could get visas for Burkina Faso. The person on the other end of the phones said that “Yes, we could get visas for Burkina Faso.” The guard let us into the embassy after handing over our cell phones to him.

We got to the visa section and walked up to the woman at the window. We asked if we could get visa for Burkina Faso. She said “Yes, we could and it would take four days.” She handed us the visa form and we realized we wouldn’t be able to fill it out at that time because we would need to gather:
1 filled-in and signed visa application form (must include address in country of main destination) 2 applicant’s recent passport size photos (format 35*45 with white background)
1 copy of the passport and previous visas
1 bank statement (showing transfer of salary for at least the last 6 months)
1 copy of the original airplane ticket
1 copy of the proof of accommodation (e.g. hotel reservation)
1 copy of the travel insurance covering medical expenses, hospitalization and repatriation in the countries to be visited

In addition to these documents, for NON-QATARIS:
1 copy of the residence permit (must be valid at least 6 months)
1 sponsor letter (must include information on salary, position and stating how long you have been employed) + ID copy of the person who signed the sponsor letter

You can also get this off the French Embassy in Qatar’s website which is interesting enough…
IN FRENCH. I had Google translate the website pages into English.

Since we are staying with John’s friend, we don’t really have 1 copy of the proof of accommodation (e.g. hotel reservation). We asked what we needed to do and we had other questions. The woman asked us to be seated and she would ask her supervisor to clarify some points for us.

In the meantime the supervisor was telling another person that was applying for a visa that it would take 10 days. This person needed to be in France for training in less than ten days. He was stuck.

When the supervisor finished disappointing this man, he spoke to the lady that had been helping us. We couldn’t hear what they were saying because they were behind thick glass. When they were finished talking, the woman called us to her window. She told us that John’s friend could fax proof of her residence in Burkina Faso. John’s friend is out in the middle of the country in Burkina Faso with a rare opportunity to use the internet and probably slim chance to use a fax. She also told us that the visa process would take TEN days. What happened to the four days she mentioned ten minutes before???? We are Americans we shouldn’t have this long delay, right? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Since we were leaving for Burkina Faso in less than ten days, we couldn’t wait for the visas from the French embassy.

According to the US Embassy in Burkina Faro’s email, “you can obtain an entry visa at the Airport of Ouagadougou if you are invited by the SIAO.” Our next question was “How do we get invited to the SIAO?” I sent two emails to two separate email accounts of the SIAO requesting an invitation. One email got bounced back to me as undeliverable because the SIAO email mailbox was too full. The other email went unanswered. John called the SIAO Organization. He spoke to an American, Lisa, working for the festival. She said she didn’t know if we could get visa at the airport, but she would check and email us back.

In the meantime I also sent a fax requesting invitations for John, Sara, who decided to join us, and I.

Two days later John received an email from the American working for the SIAO. She said we could get two week visa for Burkina Faso at the airport. My guess is to streamline the process for all the people coming for the SIAO festival...

Whatever happened to the fax that I sent the SIAO? A few days later, I received a fax from the SIAO inviting us as BUYERS (not tourists) to the festival. Our status as buyers will give us access to special pavilions and allow us into the festival earlier than tourists. So that is the cherry on top of my Burkina Faso story sundae.

After all this do we know if we can get a visa at the Ouagadougou airport? We are not completely 100% sure, we now have to hope that the information we got was right…

What would have made this easier and not taken almost two weeks to find out?