Over a million cards in possession of NIA amid SIM re-registration brouhaha

The latest figures from the National Identification Authority (NIA) suggests that over a million Ghana cards are in the authority’s possession.

The Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the NIA, Mr Abudu Abdul Ganiyu, made this known on Monday, September 12, 2022, on Angel FM/TV’s Anopa Bofo morning show.

In all, 17,151,488 persons have successfully undergone the registration exercise as of September 9, 2022.

Out of the figure, NIA has printed 16,623,128 cards, while 528,360 cards are yet to be printed.

Of the printed cards, 15,859,251 have been issued, whereas 763,877 are yet to be issued by the authority.

Thus, a round-up of the yet-to-be-printed cards with the printed number still in possession of the NIA brings a total of 1,292,237.

It is at a time when chaos seems to put a damper on the nationwide sim re-registration exercise.

The National Communication Authority (NCA) set September 30, 2022, as the deadline for the registration exercise.

People are racing against time to have their sims successfully registered to avoid consequences outlined by the NCA to the effect of the scheduled deadline.

However, the efforts to get the sims registered have been hampered by various factors. These include unissued Ghana cards and the absence of data on the issued cards.

Meanwhile, the Ghana card is the solely required document for the exercise, without which a sim card bearer cannot undergo the registration.

The situation thus forced some individuals to seek an injunction from the Supreme Court on the NCA to restrain the authority from carrying out its intended actions against persons who fail to successfully register their sims by the scheduled deadline until all registered persons access their cards.

However, in a reaction to the development, Mr Abdul Ganiyu mentioned that the NIA’s biggest concern is people not going for their cards from their district officers where the registrants undertook the exercise.

He reiterated that persons who move outside the district where they registered for the card would have to move back to the district to collect the printed cards because “we will, by all means, send the card to where you did the registration.”

Addressing the no-data issue, he stated that individuals can visit the office of the NIA to resolve the challenge. However, he noted that it is only in a few cases where the NIA’s system does not show the data on the card, “but in such circumstances the NIA prints new cards for them.”