Do you have a National ID already or not yet?
It has been four years since the Philippine Identification System Act or RA 11055 was signed by the former Duterte administration that aims to establish the national identity of Filipino citizens and resident aliens of the Republic of the Philippines.
This non-transferable identification card (PhilID) will serve as valid proof of identity and can be used for government and private sector transactions. We are not in favor of their ineffective implementation and excuses for a problem that can affect many Filipinos.
Their excuses will not cover their incompetence as government sectors. The public registration for PhilID started last July 2020 during the pandemic and began to roll out almost 8,764,556 physical cards, or 17.53 percent of the 50 million IDs required for the years 2020 and 2021 while pre-personalized cards of almost 27,356,750, or 76 percent of the 36 million required number of IDs for the end of 2021 based from the Commission on Audit’s (COA) 2021 report for the BSP’s failure to produce and deliver 116 pre-personalized physical IDs from 2021 to 2023.
With the continuous production of National ID, the BSP and PSA said they are consistently aiming for the release of almost 50 million PhilID by the end of December 2022, and yet they are still slammed by the Filipino people due to its slow production, delay, and even blurry photos in the national identification cards.
Due to its failure, many Filipinos are giving complaints and are disappointed with these government sectors because of low quality and blurry photos, a year of waiting, and delays in delivery of their Phil ID. To solve this problem, the PSA and BSP implemented the production of three types of PhilID, the printed, downloadable, and digital versions called ePhilID which can be used as an alternative by those who registered and have not yet received their National ID.
Even though it is accessible to the people, it is not an effective solution to this kind of problem. These versions are just a “printed on paper” identification, inefficient, and inconvenient as they can be tampered with or torn out. Besides, the printed version looks like a photocopy which other several private agencies, institutions, and transactions did not accept as a legal document for a person’s identification.
This has been problematic for BSP in providing a possible solution and affected almost a million Filipinos who registered for a national identification card. The government needs to address this kind of issue not by providing an ineffective solution but by addressing the slow production of physical cards. They need to create additional production facilities in Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao to ensure that it will be delivered and address this kind of matter. It is the government’s job to do the right possible solution for the benefit of the people.
No more excuses. Four years is enough.
