NID registration picking up in East New Britain

By MICHAEL PHILIP
THE roll-out of the National Identification (NID) process in East New Britain (ENB) is slowly picking up despite challenges, an official says.
Provincial mobile operations team leader William Kaluai told The National that the progress of the registration in the province depends entirely on funding support and interest shown by the people.
Kaluai said the NID registration was a government requirement and that the state had been their only source of funding to continue the roll-out of registration in the province.
“Funding support is what we really need,” he said.
“At the moment, we getting the funding support from our headquarters in Port Moresby to roll out the registration.”
Kaluai said that funding issues had affected their work since 2018.
He added that the Coronavirus (Covid-19) then became a factor in restricting their work in 2019.
He said misinformation or ignorance on the purpose of the NID cards had also hindered their work.
Kaulai said the NID office in Kokopo was in negotiations with the provincial government for assistance with the roll-out programme.
“Things are looking good. We will be expecting their support to come sometime soon.”
The NID office in Kokopo is the only one in the province and serves people from three districts – Gazelle, Rabaul and Kokopo.
Pomio district has its own NID office at Palmalmal station and they run their own operations with support from their district, he said.