Returning a loved one to Africa: how the countries compare

Seventeen countries, and almost no office in Texas

Every African country in our guides is different, but they share one thing that changes how a family should plan. The office that issues the paperwork is almost never in Texas. Most of these seventeen work through a single embassy in Washington, Nigeria through a consulate in Atlanta, and two list an honorary consul in the Dallas area. Documents travel by mail, in a fixed order, and a file that arrives incomplete comes back. That single fact, more than any rule about the body itself, is what sets the timetable. This page compares all seventeen, then sends you to the guide for your own country.

Where the office is, and what it does

Nigeria is the exception: the Consulate General in Atlanta states the service area that covers Texas and publishes its own checklist for shipping human remains. Uganda is the other partial exception, because its embassy lists an honorary consulate in Dallas alongside the Washington office, and that same Texas list gives Sierra Leone an honorary consul in Garland. For the rest, Texas belongs to Washington: the Texas Secretary of State’s list shows no consulate in the state for any of them, and South Africa’s jurisdiction table and Senegal’s jurisdiction page say so directly.

What that office does varies. Cameroon’s embassy issues a mortuary travel document and wants four complete sets of the file by mail. Tanzania’s embassy lists seven documents and issues a permit to ship once they are accepted. Rwanda asks for a letter to the Ambassador naming a relative in Rwanda. Senegal’s embassy transcribes the death certificate and signs the authorization to transfer. Kenya’s embassy issues a letter of no objection, and Ethiopia’s publishes shipment guidance with an online request form. Ghana points Texas to the Washington embassy, while a mission page sets out the repatriation steps.

The apostille divide is sharper here

In the Americas almost every country accepts a Texas apostille. In Africa the opposite is true for our seventeen. Read on the HCCH status table on September 22, 2026, only four of them appear at all: South Africa, in force since April 30, 1995; Liberia, usable only since May 20, 2015, when the United States withdrew its objection to its accession; Senegal, since March 23, 2023; and Rwanda, since June 5, 2024. Nigeria, Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Somalia, Eritrea, Sudan, South Sudan, Cameroon, Sierra Leone and DR Congo have no row in that table.

For those thirteen a Texas document cannot be finished with one certificate. As the Texas Secretary of State’s authentication page explains for countries outside the Convention, the chain runs from the state certificate to the Office of Authentications at the U.S. State Department, and then to that country’s embassy. Each step is a mailing, and the mailings are sequential. Build the calendar around that chain before anyone promises a date to relatives, and order more certified copies of the death certificate than seem necessary.

The permit that matters, country by country

South Africa is the strictest. Its 2024 guideline on human remains permits says no body may enter without an import permit from the National Department of Health, requested by email and never issued at the border, and it asks for a certificate of competence from the undertaker who will receive the body. Uganda’s published conditions come from a 2020 civil aviation circular requiring an import authorization from the Director General of Health Services. Kenya adds a health step of its own: the ministry’s Port Health guidance expects notification before arrival.

Cameroon puts part of the work inside the country: two of the documents on the embassy’s form can only be obtained in Cameroon, by the family there, which makes those relatives part of the file from the first day. Ghana regulates the receiving end instead, through the Mortuaries and Funeral Facilities Agency. Whichever shape it takes, the question to settle first is the same: which named authority has to say yes, and who asks it.

Embalming, and what the lists assume

Most of these countries assume the body will be embalmed, and two go further. South Africa’s guideline dictates the wording the embalming certificate must carry, so a certificate that says something else can fail. Rwanda asks for an embalming certificate and a non-communicable disease certificate together on its published list. Tanzania’s list assumes embalming without saying so outright, and Cameroon’s form asks for a photograph of the sealed casket.

Texas does not require embalming in these circumstances, so a family whose faith or wishes point away from it should raise the question before any preparation begins, and get the answer from the embassy in writing. On money, the published statements are thin. South Africa’s foreign ministry says what it does and does not do when a South African dies abroad, and Tanzania’s consular page is the only other one of the ten that addresses the subject. For the rest, plan on the family, an insurer or an employer paying.

Getting there from Dallas

There is no nonstop from Dallas/Fort Worth to any of these seventeen countries, so every case is a connection and the carrier is chosen for the cargo, not the fare. Emirates publishes a Dallas–Dubai route page and has announced added service to Accra and Nairobi; its Solace document describes the handling. Turkish Cargo and Kenya Airways Cargo publish their own products for human remains. A published product is not acceptance on a particular flight, and one refused booking can cost a week on a file that has already travelled by mail.

Agree the routing with the funeral director and the receiving funeral home together, and confirm who meets the flight. In most of these countries the receiving provider is also the one who deals with the health authority on arrival, which is why it should be chosen early rather than last.

Questions families ask about a return to Africa

Is there an African consulate in Dallas?

Uganda’s embassy lists an honorary consulate in Dallas. Nigeria serves Texas from its Consulate General in Atlanta. For the other eight countries in our guides the Texas Secretary of State’s list shows no consulate in the state, and the file goes to the embassy in Washington.

Will a Texas apostille be enough?

Only for three of the ten. South Africa, Senegal and Rwanda are in the Apostille Convention. Nigeria, Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Cameroon are not, so documents run from the Texas certificate to the U.S. Office of Authentications and then to the embassy.

Which African country has the strictest published rule?

South Africa. Its 2024 health guideline requires an import permit obtained before travel, never at the border, sets the exact wording of the embalming certificate and asks for a certificate of competence from the receiving undertaker.

Sources checked and case confirmation

Sources checked September 21, 2026. This page compares what our seventeen African guides report; each guide carries its own sources and check date, and rules change. Confirm the documents, fees, authentication route and receiving arrangements for the individual case. Contact Vargas–London with the city where your relative is now and the community in Africa, to discuss the next step without sending medical or identity documents through the inquiry form.