The Executive Director of the National Identification Registry (NIR), Teah Nagbe, is appealing to the House of Representatives for budgetary increment in the 2020/2021 national budget in order to enable the institution carries out its function effectively across the country. Director Nagbe made the appeal to the House’s plenary on Thursday, September 10, 2020, during his appearance to update the Legislature on the performance and challenges of the entity.
The NIR was established by an act of Legislation in 2011 to carry out national registration for Liberians and foreign residents. The institution is responsible to do a biometric identification card for everyone in the country. The entity issued residents’ ID Card for non-Liberian citizens and a Liberian citizens’ ID Card.
Addressing members of the House of Representatives during its regular session Thursday on Capitol Hill, the NIR boss told legislators that the entity is faced with budgetary constraints and, as such, it has not completed the registration process of every citizen across the country.
Director Nagbe more over called on the Legislature to exercise its oversight responsible by comparing every citizen to obtain the National Identification Card. He pointed out that banking institutions in Liberia have already started enforcing the mandate and, therefore, GSM companies operating in Liberia should be made to do the same. By enforcing legislative oversight responsibility, Nagbe claimed that citizens will turn out in numbers for the registration process.
Nagbe further suggested that the lawmakers amend the NIR act of 2011 to add on to its function voter registration for national elections. He informed the lawmakers that allowing NIR to carry out the voter registration process will safe the country US$150 million in the next ten years. He emphasized that the biometric registration will prevent the duplication of voter ID card. According to him, the biometric computer is sophisticated, to the extent that it cannot allow an individual to do double registration during election period.
Accordingly, Nagbe revealed that the biometric process is equivalent to the social security system used in the United States of America and, therefore, introducing it to the country’s electoral process will help save resources and avoid multiple voter registration. He cautioned the Legislature to empower the institution by increasing its budget to enable it reach across the country.
