The National Identification Authority (NIA) has explained there is no deadline for the Ghana Card registration.
Head of Dept. Corporate Affairs, Abudu Abdul Ganiyu disclosed this on Thursday during an interview when the Authority appraised members of Parliament on the registration exercise.
The NIA, he said, is a data identity management organization established to continue to build a database of Ghanaians and issue them with Ghana cards to use for various services.
He pointed out that though the Ghana card registration has no deadline, there are institutions that wish to rely on the Ghana Card and in line with their mandates and the law has set various deadlines.
“However, as far as Ghana Card registration is concerned, you can wake up any day any time go to our regional or district offices and register for your Ghana Card.”
“Nobody is going to tell you that registration is over for Ghana card and we are not going to register you again, that is not going to happen because it is a continuous registration process.”
Mr. Ganiyu stated the best practice in identity management across the world is that about 80% of the national population should be captured on the national identity register else it cannot be used for any purpose.
According to him, more than 80% of Ghanaians 15 years and above have been captured on the national identity register during the mass registration exercise that covered all 16 regions.
Earlier the House moved into the Committee of the Whole to enable personnel from the NIA to brief the House on their progress of work including challenges with regard to the issuance of the Ghana Card.
The NIA team was led by Minister of the Interior, Ambrose Dery.
Head of Operations of the NIA, Colonel (rtd) Peter Ghansah noted that the Ghana card will become the only source document for verifying the identities of Ghanaians & non-Ghanaians resident in Ghana; with a comprehensive database.
Since 2017 when the mass registration began, the NIA has registered a total of 16,936,934 Ghanaians.
A total of 16,743,832 cards have been printed. However, 895,140 of those cards have not been collected and 159,439 cards replaced.
The total number of foreigners resident in Ghana from 2007 to 2012 registered by the NIA currently stands at 156,339; 12,379 foreigners were registered in 2022 alone (January to July). NIA cites budgetary constraints as a major challenge.
Out of a total of GH¢326,740,669.34 that the NIA submitted for 2022, the Finance Ministry was only able to release about GH¢236mn but further reduced the allocation by GH¢180,576,176.
He stressed the allocation is inadequate for planned Diaspora registration.
He disclosed the Authority plans to bring onboard other agencies of State into its database and per the legislative instrument which operationalized the Authority’s activities, the Ghana Card will be the one document needed for voter registration.
He disclosed the NIA has plans to mop up already registered Ghanaians who don’t yet have the Ghana Card.