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Ruth Butaumocho African Agenda

Two years ago, African ministers responsible for civil registration met in the Zambian capital, Lusaka, where they pledged to strengthen mechanisms for documentation of people.

The conference, sponsored by the Economic Commission for Africa, was meant to provide strategic and policy guidance on pathways towards holistic, innovative and integrated civil registration.

It also proffered a number of guidelines on civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) and digital identity management systems to help close the identity gap in Africa where more than 500 million people have no legal identity documents such as national identity cards.

Two years after the conference, work is underway in several countries to ensure more people have access to primary documents through various civil registration programmes.

With the technological revolution that has seen an upsurge in the use of mobile devices, social media, information and communication technologies creating new channels for human interactions, civil registration becomes an integral component in ensuring that people have access to ICT.

By its nature, technology creates new channels for human interactions, economic opportunities, while shrinking distance and spaces.

It becomes a beauty, when everyone can access it, without worrying about lack of identity, which usually happens when one has no primary documentation and not recognised as a citizen.

Sadly, millions of people across the world, have no identification particulars and can best be described as “stateless”.

Lack of formal and robust identification and poor civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) on the continent has contributed to marginalisation and exclusion of many citizens.

According to a report produced by the World Bank in 2019, an estimated 1,1 billion people worldwide cannot officially prove their identity, because they do not have identification particulars.

The World Economic Forum further states that, just under half of those people — approximately 500 million — are estimated to live in sub-Saharan Africa.

The undocumented millions go about their daily business without proof of identity.

As a result, these ‘identity less’ millions miss out on basic legal, social and economic rights and opportunities.

Without proper documentation, they cannot own property, register a cellphone SIM card, open a bank account or take part in any activity where official identification is required.

Thousands, though talented, have missed out on job and education opportunities, because they do not have identification documents.

Recognising the importance of ensuring that every citizen has some form of identity, Zimbabwe has embarked on a countrywide mobile registration exercise as part of the Government’s efforts to ensure all citizens have access to primary documents and to address documentation challenges across the country.

The national exercise, which has also been planned to coincide with the forthcoming national census is also expected to clear the backlog in document issues that had been accumulating during the Covid-19 lockdowns, when civil registry was only processing burial orders.

Such an exercise will come as a relief to the San community that has been facing document challenges over the years, forcing their children to drop out of school.

Collectively, the exercise, should bring an end to a host of problems that some citizens had been facing in accessing primary documents.

Problem of distance, which continues to be a barrier for citizens who live in remote parts of the country, will be addressed, because the mobile centres would be located close to villages and business district centres.

Immediately after the mobile registration, the national census will take off and bring to the attention of the authorities, on how many people are in the country and other important demographic issues.

Once fully implemented, the Government will now be able to plan and allocate resources, knowing fully well how many people should be catered for in different areas.

Those in the know will attest that data registration is key for designing, planning, targeting, delivering, tracking, monitoring and interventions across multi-sectoral activities.

It is also imperative to know in equal measure how many people are born and die each year and the main causes of their deaths in order to have well-functioning health systems.

The only way to count everyone and to track all births and deaths is through the civil registration exercises that Zimbabwe and several other African countries have embarked on.

It is probably for the importance of civil registration that Africa set aside a day, Africa Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Day celebrated on 10 August, to increase public awareness on the importance of the timely registration of vital events, particularly births and deaths, through well-functioning civil registration and vital statistics systems.

Celebrated each year, Africa Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Day is a special day in the continent where member countries celebrate their heritage, particularly with regard to the recognition of the legal identity from birth to death of all persons, and the affirmation of key human and civil rights.

This includes the right to recognition under the law, the right to participate in society and the economy, and the right to access social services.

However, it is important to note that celebrating the day alone, without ensuring that citizens are documented, would be an empty and meaningless gesture.

The annual celebrations should be supported with pragmatic and traceable records, on the strides that member states are making in documenting their citizens through robust and inclusive civil registration.

In an era, where technology has become an integral part of life, civil registration ministries should also make use of new digital technology and pursue continuous registration of newborns to cut costs, and to make registration systems more sustainable.

The question of privacy of personal data used in identifying people and the need to be protected should also be addressed because it has also been identified as a major challenge in getting people registered.

A combination of advocacy, the application of cost-effective systems, the enactment of laws to protect data, and the subsequent updating of biometric data as these children grow up and the use of digital technology, will ensure that every African citizen would be accounted for.

Africa boasts many economic and social opportunities, it is, therefore, prudent to put everyone under the radar and ensure that they benefit from an avalanche of openings.

That will only be possible if everyone is accounted for through documentation.

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