Half a billion people in Africa lack official proof of identity, posing a significant challenge for African governments to provide essential services and ensure the basic rights of their citizens. Millions of people are unable to access critical services such as healthcare, education, and welfare which makes it difficult for them to exercise their basic rights, such as voting or living in their home countries.
The absence of reliable identification systems poses a threat for African governments. Without accurate data on their citizens, governments cannot effectively tax, conscript, or protect them, nor can they allocate resources where they are needed most. As a result, many African countries are exploring innovative solutions to address this challenge and ensure that everyone has access to reliable identification. Sub-Saharan Africa is facing an especially pressing problem, as 50% of its population lacks official identification.
Certain nations, such as South Africa and Botswana, have competent registration programs that document the majority of births and provide identification papers for almost all of their citizens. Others are struggling to get started like Congo and Liberia, who are still in the nascent stages of registering births, let alone issuing official identity documents. Meanwhile, other countries fall somewhere in between, as they transition from antiquated, paper-based systems to more advanced digital ones.
Transitioning from paper-based to digital identification systems can be a challenging process as evidenced by Nigeria, which currently has 13 federal and three state identification programs, in an attempt to establish a centralized national identification system. To achieve this result, the National Identity Management Commission was established in 2007 with the aim of issuing unique identity numbers and cards to Nigeria’s population of 180 million. However, progress has been slow, as less than 20% of the population has been registered thus far.
African countries face numerous obstacles when it comes to establishing effective identification systems. One major factor is racial discrimination, with countries like Uganda, Liberia, and Sierra Leone specifically withholding nationality from children of certain races and ethnicities. Other nations achieve the same outcome more informally by refusing to issue identification documents. Another challenge is governments’ failure to educate their citizens on the potential benefits of such systems. For instance, birth registration is the most basic form of official identity, yet sub-Saharan Africa saw a decline in registration rates over the 2000-2014 period, dropping to just 41%. In contrast, South Asia more than doubled its rate to 71%. For impoverished rural residents, traveling to government offices to register births can be a time-consuming and costly process. Some countries also charge fees for late registrations, which further discourages participation.
Financial liquidity is a significant factor behind the relative underdevelopment of identity systems for many African countries. The cost of hiring skilled labor capable of accurately filling out forms, operating biometric machines, and accessing remote areas is a considerable challenge. Moreover, the technology itself can be prohibitively expensive, particularly for smaller countries with limited purchasing power.
The biggest challenge for governments is choosing the right proprietary systems and choosing a provider aligned with the country’s interests. Semlex, for example, has been pivotal in supporting governments in Africa amidst their challenges by offering solutions that are affordable and feasible to manage. For example they offer build-operate-transfer (BOT) solutions that finance, build, and operate a project for a certain period. This allows governments to do what they do best, which is focus on governance and policy making, thereby leaving the technical work to the professionals. With BOT solutions providers take care of maintenance, upgrades and parts.
Demand and policy has shifted the way countries select their providers. These new policies, standards, and demands have resulted in companies such as Semlex, Idemia, Gemalto, and De La Rue agreeing to “open standards” – a step closer to an open-source standard. This enables different bits of a system to communicate with one another, thereby enabling the possibility for countries to purchase the parts they require from competing companies. As a result, countries can enjoy greater flexibility while benefiting from reduced costs.
Uganda, Congo, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Mali, and Madagascar, have joined an industry advisory committee to spearhead the development of open standards. According to Albert Karaziwan, the founder of Semlex Group that is a prominent identity solutions provider, the industry has previously operated similarly to a specialized industry but is gradually transitioning into a commodity industry with greater standardization.
Governments grappling with the technical challenges of identification must also address critical issues concerning rights, governance, and privacy. Specifically, the collection and misuse of unnecessary data that could facilitate violence and discrimination and deny basic privacy rights to citizens. An example is the Rwandan genocide, where identity papers listed ethnicity and facilitated the targeted persecution of Tutsis.
Regimes should avoid collecting sensitive information such as religion and ethnicity data as it is not required for the provision of essential services. By refraining from such data collection, governments can safeguard the privacy of citizens and prevent any potential misuse of such information.
Modern identity systems do bring many promises and benefits to Africa. One of those is safeguarding the privacy of citizens. Albert Karaziwan explains the ethical responsibility of solution providers, ”We are here to build a better world with accurate identification, to give every citizen a voice, a choice to vote, a choice to make a difference.”
Semlex, which provides service to over 14 countries in Africa, follows strict international protocol and compliance standards and believes the citizen rights are the most fundamental form of human rights.
It is one of many reasons for the launch of ‘Semlex for Education’, a non profit organization funded by Semlex Group. Karaziwan adds “giving back is our obligation, we care about people, and we want to help and contribute to making a better world not just by our identity services, but also by initiatives that give back to the citizens within the communities we are involved in.”
