The National Identification & Registration Authority (NIRA) has warned that it will not issue IDs to non-citizens after a section of ineligible citizens (foreigners) in areas of Masindi and Kisenyi attempted to masquerade as citizens by birth during the ongoing mass registration.

Speaking during the weekly security brief at the Naguru police headquarters on Monday, October 28, 2024, the Manager Public Relations of NIRA, Osborn Mushabe, re-echoed the ongoing mass registration being conducted by NIRA for all unregistered citizens of the country, with a main focus on those of the voting age by the time of the 2026 General Election. He, however, said that there are reports that have been circulating in the media that NIRA is denying a number of people the right to register for National IDs.

“It has come to our attention that there are several non-citizens in the country that are attempting to register for national IDs, and many of these are claiming to be citizens by birth, but they do not belong to the indigenous communities but are entitled to the citizens by birth category as enshrined in the 1995 National Constitution,” Mushabe said.

Mushabe noted that however much NIRA is registering all citizens that have never registered for national IDs, not every person living and staying in Uganda has to have a national ID.

“There are foreigners who live in this country, and there are people who do not have citizenship and live in Uganda who do not qualify to have national IDs. Only those who qualify for citizenship qualify to get national IDs, and the biggest category we have is registration by birth,” he added.

Read Also: NIRA Postpones Mass Enrollment, Renewal of National ID Cards

Mushabe elaborated that citizenship by birth in accordance with Article 10 of the 1995 Constitution of the Republic of Uganda emphasizes that the applicant must be belonging to the five indigenous communities and his or her grandparents must have been living in Uganda by 1926, when the borders of the country were demarcated.

He urged the public to be vigilant and asked all local council chairpersons and internal security structures to fully verify all these applicants before recommending them for registration of national IDs.

“If you are a citizen and you know that someone in your neighborhood is not a citizen, you can contact the security structures and also assist the identification authority to make sure that we only have citizens registered for National IDs,” he said.

Read Also: NIRA Denies Issuing National IDs to Foreigners

The free-of-service, ongoing 53-day registration exercise, which started on September 27, 2024, running up to November 23, 2024, is being conducted to inform mobile outreaches in sub-counties, parishes, schools, hospitals, places of worship, and sports grounds, among others.