The illustration of the logos of the messaging applications, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger and Facebook displayed on the screen. (PHOTO/File)
Social media! This medium of communication has totally disrupted how governments communicate with their citizens. H.E. President Museveni has for example announced all appointments to cabinet, the bench constituting judges of the High Court, Court of Appeal, and Supreme Court as well as deployments in our security forces on the medium of Twitter.
Heck, it has even, with significance, altered how humans start relationships.
“Socials” as many young people refer to them and the mobile devices on which they are run are for many a way of life. It is, in a rather apocalyptic way, not uncommon to find that the intimate family dinner time we used to enjoy has been hijacked by Instagram, Facebook, and increasingly by Tik Tok.
The more intellectual members of our communities prefer the microblogging site of Twitter.
The freedom of an avatar, pseudo account, and following has opened up our horizons with a young adult in Adjumani or in Kampala being able to shape and control the narrative with a single post which in turn leads to replica videos or posts by people hitting our insta, twitter and tiktok accounts.
In recent days have seen an account by @libianca open verse challenge with participants from all over the world record and share their favorite verses in music or from religion.
In some posts, notably from Arabia and in other conflict spots of the world, participants affixed their national flags to their posts. Why their national flags? Could this show, as indeed the Arab spring from 2011 showed, that many young people are as politically conscious as they are socially adept? Could it be that by affixing their national flags to their posts, these young people are consciously acknowledging their national identity?
Are we legally identified as Ugandans when we tag the flag against our avatars and account names? Is it against a legal identity?
Does, in Uganda’s case, being registered with NIRA and therefore having a national identification number tantamount to my being a proud Ugandan? In my view, the answer to this question is a loud YES.
Not to be registered and yet claim to be Ugandan is to masquerade.
The national Identification and Registration Authority has set out from the health facility to the parish to have all citizens from birth registered and given a legal identity which comes in form of a national identification number (NIN), those above 16 years get an actual physical card and those below get a NIN slip.
All services by National Identification Registration Agency (NIRA) by virtue of Uganda’s adoption of digital government can now be fully accessed through mobile digital devices. One needs only visit the NIRA website.
For all the pupils and students that registered in the 2017 learners exercise please call the toll-free NIRA line 0800211700, hit NIRA’s Twitter DM, and see if your application was successful and NIN generate.
Get 1st ID which is the first ID to represent the transition from the neonate to the young adult. The masquerading must stop we are proud Ugandans proud new emerging democracies armed with a NIN we can ably and accurately tag our flag.
Let’s get our NINs now, let’s get registered, and let’s stop placing a hand over our mouths while our voices patiently wait to be heard. We need to speak our truth and correctly represent our beautiful Pearl of Africa.
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