.MWILA
By DELPHINE ZULU –
GOVERNMENT says it is optimistic that the next general election will use biometric National Registration Cards (NRCs), Home Affairs Minister Davies Mwila has said.
He said the project of phasing out old National Registration Cards (NRCs) had reached an advanced stage and urged those involved to expedite the progress to allow everyone acquire new ones countrywide.
He said the installation of equipment and software was the last part remaining and was optimistic that the project would be completed within two weeks.
Mr Mwila said the consideration to use the biometric NRCs in the 2016 general elections would help curb any suspicion of vote buying through grabbing of NRCs because they would contain highly secured features that could not easily be manipulated.
The Minister was speaking through the ministry’s spokesperson Moses Suwali yesterday during the updates of the Ministry’s progress in the programme.
He said the biometric pilot project would follow immediately after the completion of installing the final equipment and software.
“This project has advanced, the only remaining feature now is the installation of software in the machines, we should be launching it in mid-February and will immediately start testing it starting with Lusaka,” Mr Mwila said.
Mr Mwila said the biometric NRCs could easily detect fraud due to security features installed.
