SOME HAVE IT,MANY DON’T A woman shows her national ID which she got at SM North in Quezon City in July last year. —PHOTO BY GRIG C.MONTEGRANDE
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) has printed a total of 50,262,059 Philippine IDs (PhilID), as well as its electronic version.
President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. told the PSA in July 2022 to deliver 50 million IDs by the end of December that year.
READ: Bongbong Marcos pledges delivery of 50 million National IDs by end-2022
“Out of the 50 million figure, a total of 30,558,332 are PhilIDs —of which, 23,256,884 are delivered as of 31 January 2023, while 19,703,727 ePhilIDs are issued to registered persons as of 2 February 2023,” said the PSA in a statement on Friday.
Due to difficulties in rolling out the national IDs in plastic forms, the PSA said in October 2022 that it will print the electric version of the ID.
READ: Gov’t issues temporary PhilSys ID cards on paper
The agency said that it worked with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas for the printing and production, and the Philippine Postal Corporation oversaw the delivery.
“The PSA also piloted the implementation of the downloadable ePhilID, which allows registered persons to download a PDF copy of their ePhilID on their mobile devices. As of 02 February 2023, 440,784 ePhilIDs were downloaded,” it said.
According to the PSA, the nationals ID is meant to streamline ease of government service, as well as “unlocking access to basic social services and promoting greater financial inclusion.”