Not all African countries require their citizens to carry a national identity card, but the number is rapidly increasing. ECOWAS Member States have committed to introduce a common-form biometric identity card by 2017. The introduction of these new systems may be based on concerns for national security or to improve delivery of public services: but for these aims to be achieved, law and procedures must ensure that people are not arbitrarily excluded from acquiring these documents.
Every citizen should have the right to a passport, enabling international travel, which should not be removed except following due process of law (for example, from a person accused of a serious crime).
Only some African countries establish an independent judicial procedure for a person to obtain a “certificate of nationality” or alternative document that is conclusive proof that a person is a national.
Ife Ogunfuwa The National Identity Management Commission says it has enrolled and issued 41 million Nigerians with National Identity Number as of today. The Director-General at the NIMC, Aliyu Aziz, in an interview with journalists, said enrolment was ongoing for…
par Sonia Rolley Des organisations de la société civile, congolaises, comme internationales, montent au créneau sur la question du marché des passeports. Publicité Jusqu’à la mi-juin, la société belge SemLex devrait les produire. Le coût officiel est de 185 dollars…
The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), the League for Human Rights (Belgium – Ligue des droits humains) and UNIS (Pan-African Anti-Corruption Network) filed a civil party petition on 8 May 2020 in the criminal investigation into the Semlex case…
By Abdullah Mwinyi On November 4, 1985, at Diamond Jubilee Hall, Mwalimu Nyerere addressed Tanzanians for the last time as President of the United Republic. He had been at the helm for 24 years, first as President of Tanganyika and…
WASHINGTON, April 28, 2020—The World Bank approved today $273 million in International Development Association (IDA)* financing for Togo, Benin, Burkina Faso and Niger to facilitate access to services for millions of people, especially women and the poorest segments of society.…
By Felister Peter THE government intends to issue national identification numbers (NIN) to citizens and residents below 18 years after it emerged that the group cannot register phone numbers biometrically. The move has been informed by the fact that NIN…
By Felister Peter The Tanzanian Communication Regulation Authority (TCRA) has registered 37,297,930 SIM cards through biometric registration system. So far the National Identification Authority (NIDA) had issued 21,823,026 national identification numbers until March this year. The authority issued NIN to…
Mobilizing governments and civil society From 2 to 5 March, in Rubavu, Rwanda, UNHCR and the newly established Government Taskforce on Statelessness convened to discuss statelessness eradication and methodologies to identify stateless persons. In line with the pledges made by…
By Keren Weitzberg A government program for citizens and refugees highlights the pitfalls of humanitarian biometrics Amina Ali Adan was born in the Kenyan town of Garissa, 65 miles away from Dadaab, one of the world’s largest refugee camps, situated…
By Maureen Odunga THREE million out of the nine million SIM cards switched off earlier due to users’ failure to finalise biometric registration have been retrieved for continued use. New figures make up 36,176, 264 SIM cards which have been…