KAMPALA, Uganda — The National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) announced Monday that upgraded national IDs for those who applied for renewal are now ready for collection.
This comes as mass enrollment for new national IDs continues across all parishes nationwide, having begun on May 27.
NIRA Registrar Claire Ollama stated that roughly 100,000 national ID cards have been printed so far and distributed to various districts.
“We, however, ask Ugandans to be patient as more people will receive notifications on where to pick their national ID cards,” Ollama said.
Applicants will collect their new IDs at the stations where their biometric data was captured.
The upgraded national IDs feature enhanced security measures, including laser engraving that embeds multiple images visible from different angles, significantly boosting their resistance to counterfeiting.
They also include a Machine Readable Zone (MRZ), a standardized section with encoded data that can be quickly read by machines like passport readers.
Additionally, the new cards incorporate a two-dimensional barcode that stores data readable by smartphones or specialized scanners, often used for URLs, text, or encrypted identification data.
