THE Registration Insolvency and Trusteeship Agency (RITA) is set to register and issue birth certificates to a total of 417,148 children aged under five years in Kagera Region.
RITA Administrator General and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Ms Angela Anatory told the ‘Daily News’ in an interview recently in Bukoba Municipal Council that the exercise is expected to be completed before June 30th, this year.
“The government has devised a new system where all under five children will be registered at their respective Ward Executive Officers (WEOs) office and at their nearest health facility. This will ensure that every child gets registration upon birth and issued with a birth certificate,” she said.
She said in the past the process was a bit tiresome whereby a parent was issued with a certificate from a health facility and was required to report to the District Commissioner’s office after three months to get a registration for his/her child.
She explained that to-date RITA had already completed the Registration and Issuance of Birth Certificates in 23 Mainland regions, with only three regions still remaining, namely Kagera, Kigoma and Dar es Salaam.
“When we complete the registration exercise in Kagera region next month we shall move to Kigoma Region and complete the exercise in Dar es Salaam region before the end of this year. The Registration and Issuance of Birth Certificates was partly delayed by the Marburg disease and had to be adjourned,” she said.
A section of stakeholders including Immigration Officials, Security and National Identification Agency (NIDA) yesterday attended an awareness training aimed to enable them to properly identify the under five children who deserve to get the registration certificates.
According to Ms Anatory, a birth certificate was a legal document which enables a person to get education from primary to university level, access health services, employment, passports and other essential services.
She appealed to Kagera residents and all Tanzanians to utilise the opportunity to register all eligible under five children at their respective Ward offices and nearest health facilities.
