STARTING today, government will issue out 30, 000 National identity cards to Ugandans aged between 16 years and above. The exercise will start with four lucky districts which include Buyende in eastern Uganda, Kasese also found in western Uganda, Lira in the north and Kampala. However the distribution of cards will start with Kampala and thereafter will be rolled out to other identified districts. According to a letter signed by the director citizenship and immigration control Geoffrey Sasagah Winzira to parliament‘s internal affairs committee, the distribution of 30,000 cards to the four districts, will work as a pilot scheme before the exercise can be extended to cover the entire country. “The distribution of these cards will therefore start in Kampala, on Monday, 15 July, 2013 and subsequently, to other pilot districts. The pilot scheme will pave way for the eventual national wide identity cards issuance to all citizens aged 16years old and above, by January, 2016,” read the letter tabled before the parliament’s committee on defense and internal affairs. The letter which was tabled by the committee chairperson Benny Namugwanya Bugembe was sent to the committee among other stakeholders on July, 9 2013. “In Kampala the exercise will start with Kololo parish, they will call out Ugandans aged between 16 years and above and they will be issued with the Identity cards. The exercise will be done by the directorate of citizenship and immigration control together with local leaders,” explained Namugwanya. Namugwanya who welcomed the move noted that the cards will be issued out basing on the available data recorded by the Uganda electoral commission during the 2011 general elections. According to the program for the exercise, cards will be issued starting with four villages in Kololo parish, followed by Kamwokya 1 and 11, Mengo Kisenyi, Bukesa among other Kampala suburbs. In the program the director citizenship and immigration control Wanzira explained that members of the public, who will come in to receive the IDs, will be verified to ensure that the real owners only receive the IDs. “This is so, to ensure that the real owners behind the pictures and biometric data are the ones who end up receiving their national IDs,” stated Wanzira. Wanzira further explained that where there is doubt, at each card issuing site, there will be a verification committee consisting of a local leader, parish security officer and the issuing officer who will be the secretary. He added that; “the role of this committee will be to vet and verify that only Ugandan citizens get National IDs”. To ensure proper supervision and effective results of the excise, Wanzira said the National information security system (NSIS) will form a high level monitoring and evaluation team that will visit the pilot sites. He said the team will consist of members of the NSIS secretariat, stakeholder representatives from the electoral commission, Uganda police residential district commissioners, (RDCS) Local council chairpersons among other stakeholders. “The main job of the monitoring and evaluation team will be to see what is done right,” said Wanzira. According to Wanzira, the production of National identity cards in an extended pilot scheme began on January 28, 2013 and was still on going with 30,000 cards ready for issuance. Last year, the ministry of internal affairs issued out national identity cards to President Yoweri Museveni, Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi and speaker of Parliament Rebecca Kadaga among other few selected very important persons. Meanwhile the ministry which was given Sh 19.13 billion for the National Identity cards project last financial year out of the Sh 25b is seeking for Sh 28b to fully implement the project in the new financial 2013/2014.
Posted on: Mon, 15 Jul 2013 07:11:09 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015