NAN-F-21
IDs
Kabul, March 29, 2017 (dpa/NAN)The Afghan government on Wednesday announced that it will soon start distributing electronic national identification cards (e-IDs) to the citizenry.
Humayun Muhtat, Head of e-ID cards project, said in Kabul:“the e-ID known as E-Tazkeras by Afganistians is equipped with a biometric data chip to identify cardholders by nationality and ethnicity.
“An initial 2010 roll-out of the cards was held up because of the question of identifying ethnicity.
“This issue has been a source of dispute for many years.”
He said that Pashtun representatives feared that naming the ethnicity of a citizen might reveal that the Pashtun population is not as large as claimed.
Other ethnicities feared being discriminated against.
“Members of other ethnicities said mentioning only the nationality Afghan would give the Pashtun population a boost as the word “Afghan” is considered synonymous with “Pashtun” by many.
“The e-ID cards will replace the old paper ones.
“They are expected to be a vital tool in reducing corruption and voter fraud,’’ Muhtat said.
Afghanistan has been planning to conduct much-delayed parliamentary elections this year, however, the date has not been set yet.
Initially, 500,000 e-ID cards will be distributed, which will take six months.
Muhtat said the initial phase is set to start within four to six weeks, in Kabul and another Afghan province, as well as at an Afghan embassy abroad.
NAN reports that the UN between Jan. 1 and April 30, 2016, 117,976 people in 24 out of 34 provinces in Afghanistan fled their homes.
The UN sais that nearly one million Afghans are internally displaced, and an additional 2.6 million are refugees in more than 70 countries.
The world organisation also added that an estimated 31,000 Afghan civilians have been killed in direct violence since October 2001. (dpa/NAN)
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Edited by Celine-Damilola Oyewole/Sadiya Hamza