The National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) has assured Ugandans that their old National IDs will remain valid personal documents even as the country begins issuing new high-tech identification cards.
NIRA Registrar Claire Olama said the old cards will not be confiscated during collection of the upgraded IDs. She explained that each old card will instead receive a small administrative punch mark to show it has expired while preserving all readable information.
“What we for long prayed for, what we registered and hoped to get, was our new, beautiful, new-tech cards. Now it’s time to begin to pick them up,” Olama said.
She noted that applicants must present their old ID to verify their identity before receiving the upgraded card. “We look at it, we check if you’re the one, and once we find that your card is ready, we ask you to provide your biometric—your fingerprints or your iris—so that we complete the process and issue your new National ID,” she said.
Olama stressed that the old ID will be returned to its owner after marking. “This old card remains your document, and you will still take it home. However, the NIRA officer must put an administrative mark in the form of a single punch on a blank corner that does not have data,” she explained.
She warned applicants to ensure the punch does not affect their barcode since NIRA still needs the old card to remain readable. The mark invalidates the document number without affecting key identification features.
“After that, you walk away with two cards—one very clean, with no mark on it, and the old one with an invalidation mark in one corner that does not compromise its readability,” she added.
Olama urged the public to maintain order at collection centres. “Happy card picking. I hope we will be people of decorum. We will line up, we will be patient, and as NIRA, we promise you that everybody who asks will get feedback from us about their application, and we shall all get national IDs,” she said.
NIRA is continuing to issue the new generation cards at designated centres across the country.