Q FM Africa's Modern Radio
Government has announced that it will give an amnesty to all ineligible young Zambians who acquired the national registration cards below the age of 12 years old prior to the august 12th 2021 general elections to surrender the cards to the government so that they can start afresh.
Home Affairs and Internal Security Minister Jack Mwiimbu has confirmed the Non Eligible Zambians where later allowed to vote last year.
The minister has further warned that the long arm of the law will follow all those who were involved in enticing ineligible children to access NRCs.
Mr. Mwiimbu says in certain areas the numbers of registered voters grew dramatically as a result of children who were issued with national registration cards.
He adds that government will not allow anyone who will be encouraging young children to be involved in criminal activities.
And speaking when he gave a ministerial statement on the status of the implementation of the Integrated National Registration information systems (INRIS), Mr. Mwiimbu says the current manual based system lack mechanisms to prevent foreigners from registering as Zambians, especially during outreach programmes such as the mobile issuance of national registrations in border areas.
He says the I-N-R-I-S, however, will assign a national identity number at birth as opposed to when a citizen is 16 years old stressing that this will make it very difficult for any ineligible person to register as a Zambian citizen.
The minister has assured Zambians that the ministry of home affairs through the department of national registration, passport and citizenship will do its best in ensuring that all citizens and eligible residents are uniquely identified to promote internal security and also to enhance service delivery by both government and the private sector.
Meanwhile Mr. Mwiimbu says the value of this migration and to cooperate during this very important national programme as routine enrolment has commenced, while field mobile enrolments are planned to commence as soon as resources are made available.
The exercise is estimated to cost a total of k1,069,366,200.
This includes deploying of the system to district offices, enrolment of citizens through routine and mobile registration as well as issuance of cards.