The Ministry of Home Affairs, Immigration, Safety, and Security is calling on all individuals who are not registered for national documents to do so during an ongoing outreach program.

In commemorating Africa Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Day at Okandjira in the Otjozondjupa Region, the ministry wants to ensure that all citizens have a legal identity.

The eighth Africa Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Day, which takes place annually on 10 August, aims to record, count, and identify all citizens.

The Executive Director in the Ministry, Nghidinua Daniel, highlighted that Namibia has made progress from a fragmented, paper-based register to a functional, integrated and secure web-based population register that now serves as the backbone of the national digital transformation agenda. 

Daniel stated that this transformation has created public infrastructure, underpins economic growth and will contribute to a more inclusive society.

"When we give you an identity card, that card is supposed to open doors for you. To either go to the hospital or get your pension if you are a pensioner. If you want to use government services again, you use that as your passport. So if you get married, we will issue you a certificate. And then we also recognise that maybe for understandable reasons you decide to separate or to divorce again; we issue you a document."

There remains a need to enhance collaborative efforts, strengthen systems and promote standardisation to achieve 100% completeness in civil registration.

Daniel said there are still many children unregistered within their first year, while the quality of death data remains weak.

The Ministry commenced with an outreach programme in June, which will run until the end of this month to register people in marginalised communities. Their target is to register 16,000 people.

Communities are invited to register.