Instant National ID Card starts Sept 15
The National Identification Authority (NIA) will issue the first of
the proposed Ghana National Identity Card from September 15, 2017.
According to Prof. Kenneth Agyemang Attafuah, Executive Secretary of
the NIA, persons living in areas with good internet coverage will get
their cards within 10 minutes of their filling the appropriate forms,
while those with unreliable or non-existent coverage will have the
printing of theirs deferred for a short period.
“You can expect to see a card on the 15th of September, 2017, when we
roll out,” Prof Attafuah assured at a media interaction on Monday June
12, 2017. “We want to implement an instant card issuance system. You
register with us and within 10 minutes maximum you get the card and walk
away.”
It would be recalled that the Vice President, at a meeting with key
stakeholders in late January, announced government’s decision to
implement three key programmes required to formalise the Ghanaian
economy and set an end of year timeline for their implementation.
They are a National Identification System, a Digital Addressing System and Interoperability between the telcos, banks and any other payment systems.
Four committees set up to analyse the various processes required to
set up a national ID system have since submitted their report, and the
President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has directed the NIA to
immediately engage with Identity Management Systems (IMS) Limited, a
private identity management company to “agree on the modalities to
ensure the efficient roll-out of the National Identity System (NIS)
project not later than 15th September, 2017”.
The NIA has accepted the challenge and is poised to meet the
deadline, although the time it takes to issue a card will be determined
by a number of factors, including internet connectivity, Prof Attafuah
pointed out.
“There may be areas in this country where internet connectivity may
be a challenge. In such locations, there would be deferred printing – it
may be a day, it may be a couple of days. In such circumstances
deferred printing may be inevitable.
“So there are options: people will get the cards on the 15th. Those
who are able to register on the 15th and from that day onwards anyone
registering can expect to get the card instantly, because that is what
we are aiming at.
“I must qualify that to say in those rare circumstances where
sometimes as in my village, there may not be internet connection, that
there may be a delay by a day or two, or just a few hours. Sometimes
internet is not the most stable.”
The NIA, Prof Attafuah said, is working with key stakeholders like
the National Information Technology Agency (NITA) to identify areas with
low or non-existent internet availability to plan appropriately for the
capturing of data and issuance of cards for residents in those
communities.
“We’re working with NITA and the technical committee to map out this
country and colour code in terms of availability of data connectivity so
that before we roll out we know where connectivity may be a problem and
then to develop auxiliary measures to address those deficits in
connectivity.”
Source: Starrfmonline.com
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