Significance of National ID Systems in Africa :

1
Significance of National ID Systems in Africa

• The Ghanaian Experience
• By
• MOSES K. BAIDEN jnr
• CEO
• MARGINS GROUP/GIDC
• GHANA

2
What is a National ID System ?

• Collection and management of
• Alphanumeric data, pictures and biometric
  information
• Citizens, residents and special categories of
  people determined by Law
• Prescribed format for data collection details
• Unique and positive identification of citizens

3
Concept of National Identity System

• Prescribed by Law
• Governments seek to achieve objectives by
  legislation.

4
Governments Objective fundamentally to collect
data to better serve their people.

• Planning purposes
• Make rights and privileges of citizens easier to
  exercise
• Discharge of duties and obligations to
  Government.
• Better access to public and private services

5
Fundamental Objectives

• Proposed by Governments determine-
• Fundamental Laws to be enacted
• Financing options
• These then determine the steps taken to bring
  this into reality.

6
National ID System for Ghana.

• History
• NRCD129, November 1972 The Identity Card Decree
  
• 1991, Social Security and National Insurance
  Trusts Tender Turnkey National ID System
• 2001 the Government of the New Patriotic Party
  (NPP) announced implementation of a National
  Identification System.

7
Fundamental objectives of the system

• Create alpha numeric, picture and biometric
  database
• Positive, unique identification of citizens and
  residents over the age of 6 years
• Plan and provide better public/private services
• NIS parent of all other Sub-databases,
  verifiable, positive and secure for use.

8
A good National Identification System (NIS)

• Benefits Have tremendous political, social
  economic significance.
• Registration of voters
• Immigration/ Border control
• Official Documents-Passports, Drivers License,
• Register of Births/ Deaths
• National Security
• Revenue Collection
• Public service delivery/ Human development

9
A good National Identification System (NIS)

• Social Security and National Insurance
• National Health System
• Unemployment Benefits
• Right to work / Work permit
• Banking/ Credit information
• Crime control (connection to criminal database
  system)
• Elimination of ghost names -Government payrolls
• War on terror

10
Objectives of the system

• Affected-
• Terms for tender, the decision on how to finance
  the NIS, and also legislations to be enacted in
  parliament
• Speed/ coverage of all citizens and residents six
  (6) years and above.
• Technical solution with training for public body.
• Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) Contract was
  not appropriate,

11
2003, The Tender

• Turnkey Technical System
• 24 month implementation period/ further 24 month
  warranty
• 15 local preference margin on the value of local
  content.
• Winning bid, Sagem Consortium of Five (5) Local
  Companies.
• Consortium initiated by Margins ID Group- Ghana
  IDentification Company , its turnover 30 of the
  total contract.

12
GIDC Contract

• Boosted the profitability of these Companies
• Enhanced their technical capacity
• Intelligent Card Production Systems Limited,
  subsidiary of Margins ID Group built a state of
  the art Card Factory in Accra.

13
Structure of Winning Bid for Prime Contractor

• Technical System-
• AFIS
• Servers
• Mobile Registration Workstations
• Some consumables
• Software
• Training and technical and know how transfer
• Integration
• Project Management

14
Structure of Winning Bid for GIDC,
(Subcontractor)

• Provide Equipment and Consumables, for which the
  Consortium Companies had Distribution Rights to
  in Ghana, and consumables and Services available
  locally eg.

15
Structure of Winning Bid for GIDC, (Subcontractor)

• Card Printers/ Consumables
• Computer Workstations
• Notebooks (for MRWS)
• Cameras/ Inkjet printers/ Consumables
• Oracle Database
• Blank Pre-printed Cards
• Data Forms
• Manpower
• Support/ Maintenance
• Training

16
Structure of Winning Bid

• A virtual Public, Private Partnership
• GIDC - Supplier, Support, Maintenance/
  Implementation Company,
• Prime Contractor trained Trainers, to train the
  NIA.

17
Structure of Winning Bid

• Very stable structure for an African environment
• Trained Human Resource in Public Sector very
  high mobility after training,
• Can bring a Project to a halt.

18
Brief Overview Of Ghana NIS System

• Data Collection, 1500 Mobile Registration
  Workstations (MRWS in Ghana)
• Data Transfer to the Data Centers
• Cleaning of the Database (Networked)
• Clean Database with duplicates removed

19
Brief Overview Of Ghana NIS System

• Printing Cards batches, Region/ Districts
• Security Printed 10 year Card
• Delivery - Collection Points, Biometric 11
  Verification every Card Delivery
• Connection of Server to Outer Sub-Systems for
  Cross Checking ID 1MANY

20
Legislation Passed By Parliament To Support The
NIS System

• National Identification Act
• Privacy Law

21
The Significance Of National Identification Act

• Sovereignty on ownership of Data and System
• Authority of NIA
• NIS as a National Project
• Protection of Citizens Data
• Funding Sources for NIA.
• NIS a necessity not a luxury, a National asset
  for the People of Ghana.

22
Significance of Privacy Act

• Fear of Big Brother
• Limitation on Data to be collected
• Prevention of identity theft and private sale of
  Data etc.

23
Significance Of A Central Civil Register As A
Basis Of All Government IDs

• Reliable clean National Civil Registry
• Check against forgery or Security Breach.
• Cost of Multiple Collection of Data eliminated
• Expenditure of other government agencies only on
  Card or Document Printing
• Hopefully make bribery/corruption a thing of the
  past, by providing a basis of e-government eg.
  Web portals for government services

24
CONCLUSION

• Avoid the intractable problems that prevent
  Citizens exercising their Rights/ Privileges,
• Fulfillment of Governments Duties and
  Obligations under
• the Constitution of the Republic
• A good NIS can be self financing
• A good NIS Can leap Africa, into the First
  world by improving politics governance, social
  economic welfare of the people.