The mass registration exercise for the National Identification System (NIS) begins in the Greater Accra Region tomorrow, Wednesday, November 18, 2009.The exercise will be in four phases, with each phase covering specific districts and areas.The first phase will cover the Dangbe East and West districts, as well as Tema, Ashaiman and Adenta.

Phase two will cover the Ga East, Ga West and Ga South districts while phase three will cover Okaikwei, Ablekuma and Ashiedu Keteke.

The final phase will cover Osu Clottey, Ayawaso and Kpeshie, including Ledzokuku Krowor.

Each phase will be for the duration of about two weeks with the exercise in the region expected to end in the first week of February 2010.

The Executive Secretary of the NIA, Dr. William Ahadzie, who disclosed this, said logistics and personnel have already been moved to various registration centres for the start of the exercise.

The National Identification Authority (NIA) will use the polling stations of the Electoral Commission as registration centres.

In each phase, 1500 registration centres will be opened and an equal number of mobile registration workstations (MRWs) deployed.

The MRWs are portable computerised system for taking biometric and other personal data.

An additional strategy aimed at covering the high population density in the region will be the use of Special Registration Teams assigned to register categories of public officials who perform essential public duties, including some hospital workers, officials in foreign missions and members of the security services.

Applicants who go to the registration centres need to know their age, date and place of birth, house number or the name of the home owner, home town and district.

Some verification documents needed are a birth or baptismal certificate, a Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) membership card, a voter’s identity card, a passport, a driver’s licence and National Health Insurance (NHIS) card.

Any of the documents is required as a verification document. Applicants with all of these documents will finally be linked to the Ghana card, which is the national identification card when it is finally issued.

Registration centres will be manned by a registration officer, a registration assistant, a mobile registration work station operator and a queue controller.

Challenges encountered in previous exercise in the Central, Western, Eastern and Volta regions, such as malfunctioning MRWs and the remuneration of MRWs operators as well as other field challenges have been resolved and are not to reoccur Dr. Ahadzie said.

Daily Graphic