MPs Fail To Show Up For Ghana Card Registration

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No Member of Parliament has so far been registered in the special ongoing Ghana card registration underway in Parliament.

Citi News’ visit shows that even though an area has been set up in the house since morning to register lawmakers, no MP has turned up yet for the exercise.

Many suspect the absence of MPs is because they do not sit on Mondays.
The Minority members have already announced they will boycott the exercise.

The officials of the NIA are however expected to brief parliament on the roll out plan tomorrow [Tuesday].

Minority Spokesperson on Mines and Energy, Adam Mutawakilu, insists the Minority will not take part.

“If for their personal reason they [Majority] are not here, that is none of my business. Once the Minority is not taking part whether they [Majority] are here or not, it is not our business.”

Minority MPs’ threat

The National Democratic Congress Minority in Parliament had earlier declared a boycott of the registration exercise.

A statement issued by the caucus leader, Haruna Iddrisu, said they are unable to take part in the process due to several challenges including the limitation of the registration to only persons with birth certificates and passports.

“We remain opposed to the restriction of identification requirements for registration to Passports and Birth Certificates. Our analysis shows that this will prevent about 23 million Ghanaians from obtaining the Ghana Card and deprive them of any benefit thereof.”

It said it was surprising that a planned meeting to receive a briefing from the National Identification Authority (NIA) on the process had been postponed indefinitely.

The statement further accused the NIA of not being transparent in communicating details of the Ghana card project to the public, noting that its information showed that the total cost of the project was $1.4billion with a tax exemption of $176 million, although the Chief Executive Officer of the NIA, Prof. Ken Attafuah, insists that the project will cost $ 293 million.

“We are also aware that despite the provision of Government support by the Akufo-Addo government in respect of revenue projections for the project, this has not been brought to Parliament for approval in accordance with Ghanaian Law,” it added.

Parliament is among the key public institutions that have been selected for early registration of its staff for the National ID, also known as Ghana card.

Officials of the Presidency were issued with the cards last week following an earlier absence by the NIA on an initial promised date.

‘We’ll resist identification mode.’
Meanwhile, former President John Dramani Mahama has also described as illogical the criteria announced by the NIA for the registration.

According to him, the move will denationalize over 20 million Ghanaians. He however assured that the NDC will do everything possible to have the identification scope expanded.

About the Ghana card

The issuance of a National Identification ID card is among the government’s key promises to formalize the country’s economy.

Under the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government in 2009, the NIA began the process to register and issue the National ID card to all Ghanaians.

About 11 million people in six regions of the country were registered as part of the process between 2009 and 2010.

The cards were however not fully ready for collection among other challenges.

Most banks and some state institutions also rendered them useless as they rejected them as an unrecognized state ID card.

By: citinewsroom.com