NIDA clears air over shortfalls in printed national IDs

NIDA has stated that the erasure of details on national identification cards is a minor error currently under investigation

TANZANIA: THE National Identification Authority (NIDA) has stated that the erasure of details on national identification cards is a minor error currently under investigation.

“Currently, experts are investigating to determine the source of the challenge during production, whether it was due to machinery or ink, in order to seek compensation without additional costs to the government,” stated NIDA’s Director of Identification Cards Department, Edson Guyaye.

“There have been misleading reports questioning the quality of the national IDs following this minor challenge.

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Let me assure the citizens that the IDs provided by the NIDA meet international standards,” said Mr Guyaye.

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He disclosed that out of 21.3 million national identification cards printed, only 21,224, or 0.09 per cent, have been affected by issues such as erased names, ID numbers, or birthdates either on the front or back of the ID.

“Let me urge citizens whose IDs have this challenge to return them to the NIDA district office, ward office or village government office where they collected them,” he stated.

He said the authority had already directed its registration officials in all districts to collect such IDs.

“The Authority has received report that some identification cards have been deleted. The data we have show that a total of 21,224 identification cards have had the problem of erasing either names, dates or pictures,” said Mr Guyaye.

The cards with a problem are almost 0.09 percent of all generated IDs.

The authority asked the citizens to return those IDs to the NIDA district office of the ward or village where they took the ID.

“We have already provided instructions to our registration officers in all districts in the country to collect identification cards with this challenge.”