NIDA unveils plan to distribute 1.2m uncollected national IDs

DAR ES SALAAM: Over 20 million Tanzanians have been issued their respective national identification cards as the National Identification Authority (NIDA) works closely with the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) to reach 1.2 million others who have not yet collected their IDs.

Briefing reporters in Dar es Salaam yesterday, the authority’s Director General, James Kaji, said NIDA reached the milestone thanks to a total of 42.5bn/- released by the government to boost mass production of the cards.

The funds, the NIDA boss added, enabled the authority to procure over 13 million raw cards before starting mass production and mass distribution of the IDs at ward, village, and local government offices.

Kaji explained that as of December last year, since NIDA began registering citizens in 2012, a total of 20,082,768 of the 21,115,671 cards had been collected.

However, despite distributing the cards to local government offices to ease collection, over a million IDs remain uncollected. This has forced the authority to collaborate with TCRA to contact the individuals through short messaging services (SMS).

“We have learned that some people don’t care about collecting their IDs because they already have their National Identification Number (NIN). Others have relocated to different areas, and some have passed away,” said the NIDA boss, explaining why 1.2 million cards are still uncollected.

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He said the authority decided to collect all uncollected IDs from local government offices and place them at NIDA offices in district centers, where citizens can retrieve them after receiving SMS notifications.

“The SMS being sent to them warns that if they do not collect their IDs within the specified time, their NINs will be deactivated. The aim is to ensure that the IDs, which have cost a lot of money to produce, are all collected,” he emphasized.

On another note, the NIDA Director General said the authority has started reissuing new IDs for free after recalling a total of 31,000 cards that reportedly had various defects.

Recently, the Minister for Home Affairs, Innocent Bashungwa, ordered the authority to ensure that the over 1.2 million uncollected cards are distributed.

The National Identification Authority (NIDA) was established by the National Identification Authority (Establishment) Instrument, 2008, with the mandate to register and issue National Identification cards to Tanzanian citizens and legal residents.

Legal residents’ dependents aged 18 years and above are also eligible to obtain a NIDA ID.