ID registration shifts to sub-county level

By Raymond Baguma      

                   
The internal affairs minister Gen. Aronda Nyakairima has said the national ID project can serve as a model for how government can efficiently deliver services using a multi-sector approach.

He said the approach has involved different government agencies that included the directorate of citizenship and immigration; Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS), Electoral Commission (EC), Uganda Registration Services Bureau (URSB) and the National Information Technology Authority (NITA).

Aronda was on Friday meeting journalists at Imperial Royale Hotel to update them on the continuous registration exercise for national IDs, which has been shifted to the sub county level.

Aronda said there is a sense of urgency because other East African Community (EAC) member states have national IDs. He said Uganda needs to have national IDs to operationalize the EAC protocol on free movement of goods, services and people, where identity cards will be used as travel documents.

Aronda hailed the role played by politicians, religious leaders and the media which was critical in mobilizing the public in order for the mass registration exercise to succeed.

He said that the national ID registration project had created over 100,000 jobs for enrolment officers, and provided employment to youths.

Aronda said that there is a plan being mooted to establish a government authority responsible for national identification so that ID enrollment is a continuous process.

Pontius Namugera, the manager in charge of mass enrollment said that with the closure of mass enrollment, continuous enrollment for IDs will go on at sub counties throughout the country.

He said that all activities are on schedule with 14.8 million people enrolled so far, against a target of 18 million people.
The remaining 3.2 million will be registered in the next six months.

Namugera said that the department of citizenship and immigration has established four levels of citizenship verification in the local community which include elders and parish chiefs.

The second level of verification is a team at Kololo who will scrutinize all documents from the field and will approve or reject ID issuance.

He said that those whose documentation is not satisfactory will be informed and given a chance to appeal.
However if they are aggrieved, they can go to courts of law.

Col. Stephen Kwiringira, the head of the ID project said there are plans to put in place a mechanism to enable Ugandan soldiers serving on peace missions and operations abroad to enable them register.

Ugandan troops are presently deployed in Central African Republic, South Sudan and Somalia.

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