MANILA, Philippines — The government is eyeing to complete 80 to 90 million registrations under the national identification (ID) system before the end of President Rodrigo Duterte’s administration, acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua said Wednesday.
Fast-tracking the implementation of the national ID system was among the marching orders of the President to the new National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) chief.
“Ang layunin ay matapos na po ang halos (The goal is to complete about) 80 to 90 million registrations before the end of the administration,” Chua said in an online briefing.
Earlier, Chua said the goal by the end of 2020 is to register five million household heads. He said this is more feasible than registering everyone in each household.
Chua said he has also asked the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) if they could hasten to register more Filipinos to ease the implementation of the government’s welfare programs.
“Ang balak ngayon ng Philippine Statistics Authority ay mag-register ng five million this year. Pero ang sabi ko po sa kanila kung pwede mas mabilis at mas marami ang i-register kasi ‘pag makatanggap ng national ID yung ating kababayan, sila po ay pwedeng makilala na sa mga iba’t ibang social amelioration program,” Chua said.
(The Philippine Statistics Authority plans to register five million this year. But I asked them if they could hasten and could register more since the national ID will allow our fellow Filipinos to be known under various social amelioration programs.)
“At pwede rin po silang magbukas ng bank account para yung pagbigay ng tulong hindi na yung cash and door-to-door na ginagawa natin ngayon,” he added.
(And they could also open a bank account so that the distribution of aid will not be in cash or door-to-door unlike what we are doing now.)
It was in August 2018 when the President signed the Philippine Identification System Act into law which seeks to harmonize and integrate several government IDs by establishing a single national identification system.
Duterte earlier admitted the national ID system could have speeded up the distribution of the government’s cash subsidy amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.