The government expects to register some 10,000 individuals for the pilot testing of the national identification system which will run from Sept. 2 to December this year, according to officials Tuesday.
National Economic and Development Authority chief and Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia said on the sidelines of the 3rd Economic Journalists Association of the
Philippines Forum in Manila that “Once it’s [the registration] perfected we can already ramp up the registrants.”
“Next year we will be ramping up as soon as the pilot test will show that we are implementing the National ID the right way,” Pernia said
He added: “Then we are going to ramp up so that next year, we should be doing 50 million registrants, and then the following year, 2021, another 50 million so that by the end of the [term of the Duterte] administration, we would have covered virtually all Filipinos including OFWs,” he said.
There are to date nearly 108 million Filipinos from Tawi-Tawi to Batanes.
On the other hand, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Governor Benjamin Diokno said the central bank had volunteered to print the national ID.
President Rodrigo Duterte earlier ordered the “best and safest system” in the implementation of the national ID system which covers Filipino citizens and foreign residents.
Signed by the President on Aug. 6 last year, Republic Act 11055 or the Philippine Identification System (PhilSys Act) seeks to harmonize, integrate, and interconnect the countless and redundant government IDs by establishing a single national identification system.
The Phil-ID will contain the PhilSys number and the cardholder’s full name as well as facial image, sex, date of birth, blood type, and address.
Biometric information such as a full set of fingerprints and iris scan are also in the card.