The launch of the issuance of new identity cards today marks a milestone in a process that has crossed hurdles since 1990.
Today marks a new beginning in the acquisition of the National Identity Card; a civil status document which is evidence of nationality. The new identification system that will be launched today with the new provider, GEMALTO, is the second phase of the drive to ensure the security of national identity cards since falsification and other related malpractices had made Cameroonian nationality accessible to foreigners with sometimes unorthodox intentions.
The new system is the handwork of members of the Supervisory Committee tasked with the supervision of operations to put in place a new secured identification. In effect, while commissioning the members of the Committee on August 12, 2016, the President and Delegate General for National Security, Martin Mbarga Nguele, reminded them that the new Identification System fell in line with government’s policy to modernise and secure its civil status system which had become permeable and prone to all sorts of manipulation.
A year later, this worry remains, especially as cross-border insecurity perpetrated by the terrorist sect, Boko Haram, and armed former rebel groups from the Central African Republic, is ever present. The need to identify such criminals often embedded in communities had to first of all start with protecting the national identification system to prevent them from gaining access.
It should be recalled that the security of Cameroonian nationality was the concern of the Head of State, Paul Biya, when he kicked off the drive for secured national Identity cards by issuing the September 4, 2007 Presidential Decree defining characteristics and modalities for issuing the National Identity Card. The current ID Card is a product of this decree.
Way back in 1990 when the political climate exposed the necessity to keylock Cameroonian nationality from infiltration, Law No. 90/042 of December 19, 1990 instituting the National Identity Card, was adopted. This was followed by the Programme for the Security of Cameroonian Nationality under which the “computerised ID Card” approach was adopted.
