Former President John Dramani Mahama has said the identification criteria announced by the National Identification Authority (NIA), for any Ghanaian who seeks to register for the card is irrational – insisting that it will denationalize over 20 million Ghanaians.
Speaking to teaming NDC supporters on Saturday during the party’s final Unity Walk, John Mahama however assured that the National Democratic Congress (NDC), will do everything possible to have the identification scope expanded for the exercise.
“The NDC is going to do everything to fight for the best interest of the majority of the people to make sure that they are able to be identified and be given cards so that they can be identified as Ghanaians and that nobody is denationalized because of this process,” he said.
It is reported that the NIA is only accepting passports or birth certificates as the mode of identification for the exercise.
Although some Ghanaians have raised concerns with the limited mode of identification, the NIA seems not be bothered with such concerns.
“We will use every legitimate instrument that is possible under a democracy to ensure that every Ghanaian is able to register as a Ghanaian.”
He said the NDC will fight in the interest of Ghanaians because the Ghana card will soon become “the single most important identification for every Ghanaian.”
“One of the villages in my constituency and let me use an example, Horeyere. It’s a small community in Bole Bamboi. Perhaps nobody in the whole of Horeyere has a certificate or a passport. So for the 300 or 400 people in Horeyere with nobody having a birth certificate or a passport to prove that they are Ghanaian, how are you going to register those people in Horeyere.”
“So it is illogical and shortsighted and a very strong symbol of incompetence that you cannot think far and see that on the basis for what you have prescribed as the criteria for the qualification for the national ID card, you are going to disenfranchise more than 20 million of our citizens and that is unacceptable.”
He said the NDC “shall not accept it, we will not stand by and let this happen.”
John Mahama argued that the limited identification scope by the NIA is “a deliberate attempt to denationalize some of our people.”
By: Joseph Nii Ankrah
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