Foreigners registered in Southern Region

Sep 15, 2017 Top News 110
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Malawi24
NRB

Government has said many foreigners managed to register during the National Identity mass registration campaign in the Southern Region.

This was revealed on Wednesday, September 13 at Ryalls hotel in Blantyre at a joint press conference by US Ambassador to Malawi Virginia Palmer and Ministry of Home Affairs and Internal Security Grace Chiumia.

Grace Chiumia
Chiumia says many foreigners managed to register.

At the conference, it was noted that some districts bordering with Mozambique registered more people than the estimated populations of the districts.

According to statistics delivered at the press conference, Blantyre registered 98% of the estimated population, Nsanje 105.7%, Chikwawa 107.4%, Mulanje 99.3%, Thyolo 95.4%, Neno 105.3%, Mwanza 109.2% and Chiradzulu 80.6%.

Responding to why this was happening, minister of home affairs and internal security Chiumia said that the figures really showed that many foreigners managed to register in the border districts.

She however assured people not to worry about this claiming no foreigner will be given a Malawian ID card.

Chiumia further said measures have been put in place to identify all foreigners who got registered.

At the conference, Palmer officially announced the statistics for phase 3 of the national ID mass registration campaign.

Ambassador Palmer said in Phase 3, just as in phase 1 and 2, the NRB has achieved nearly full registration coverage among the eligible population and said registration coverage is at 98.5 % in phase 3.

The ambassador said in Phase 3, the estimated number of registrants was 2,256,000 but to date 2,222,000 persons have had their personal data collected by the registration teams representing about 98.5% coverage of the projected eligible population.

She further said in Chiradzulu district, the registration coverage is low at 80.6% claiming there are many people who commute for work to Blantyre and for most of these, it was more convenient to register at centres in and around Blantyre.

“I am delighted to inform you that in Phase 3, just as in phase 1 and 2, the NRB has achieved nearly full registration coverage among the eligible population. So far, registration coverage is at 98.5 % in phase 3.

“You may recall that in Phase 1, we reached 97.2 %and in Phase 2, the teams reached almost a 100% registration of the projected number of people who are entitled to a National ID,” said Palmer.

The National Registration Bureau has since said that it will not relent until every Malawian citizen in the 8 districts of Phase 3, and in the entire country, has had the opportunity to register.