Foreigners being given national IDs, say leaders

People line up for National Identity Card registration at Kololo Airstrip in Kampala in April last year. Leaders in Kalangala say many foreigners have National Identity Cards. FILE PHOTO

Kalangala- Leaders in the island district of Kalangala have raised the red flag over the presence of foreigners with National Identity Cards.
Many foreigners who possess Ugandan national IDs, according to district authorities, are mostly Tanzanians, Rwandans and Congolese.

Mr Willy Lugoloobi, the Kalangala District chairperson, said their investigations revealed that the foreigners acquire national identity cards with the help of village chairpersons.

“When these people [foreigners] come here, they connive with village chairpersons whom they pay to get recommendation letters for national identity cards. This is too dangerous and has to stop forthwith. It is illegal for any foreigner to own a Ugandan national identity card,” Mr Lugoloobi said during an interview on Saturday.

Last year, the National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) decentralised the issuance of National Identity Cards to be handled at their district centres.

Mr Lugoloobi said because of having National Identity Cards foreigners are benefiting from government programmes such as Operation Wealth Creation meant for only Ugandans.

“These [foreigners] people have come in large numbers. We are yet to establish how many they are. We do not stop them from staying here but they are not supposed to benefit from our programmes. If you go to some of the landing sites foreigners settled there possess our national IDs,” he said.

Affected landing sites
Foreigners with Ugandan National Identity Cards, according to Mr Lugoloobi, are mainly around landing sites of Milindi, Nkese Lujjabwa, Nkose and Miyana , Kikwiri, Buyinja, Kachungwa, Butulume, Kyeserwinzi all in Mazinga Sub-county. Others are in Namisoke and Kawafu in Bubeke Sub-county.
Mazinga Sub-county has 3,416 residents out of the district’s 54,292 people.

He said he had ordered village chairpersons to stop issuing recommendation letters to foreigners to attain National Identity Cards, lest they will be arrested.

“If they continue with this illegal activity, we will have no option, but to take them to courts of law because many Ugandans are suffering as foreigners enjoy services which would have benefited them,” he said.
Mr Rajab Ssemakula, the Kalangala District speaker, warned that if the cards are not withdrawn, foreigners might misuse them at the expense of the country’s image.

Kalangala has in the past decade witnessed a massive influx of foreigners mainly Rwandans, Congolese and Tanzanians who enter the islands to work on oil palm fields and landing sites. Mr John Bosco Mubiru, the Kalangala village chairperson in Kalangala Town Council, blamed the problem on government which he says has failed to tighten security on Lake Victoria.

“There are security lapses on the water. Tanzanians and Rwandans have continued to enter Kalangala through the porous border points, something that needs to be addressed,” he said.

“We really find it difficult to differentiate non-Ugandans from Ugandans, these people [foreigners] have in the past years been entering Uganda and they have stayed here for so long, they have married here, and are giving birth to children,” Mr Mubiru added.

Strategy
In the neighbouring Kyotera District, Ms Pamela Watuwa, the Resident District Commissioner, said they were facing a similar problem but with cooperation with police and local leaders they registered all foreigners prior to the issuance of national IDs by NIRA.

“Every village leader was tasked to register all foreigners in his area and by the time the exercise kicked off we were already knew how many they are,” she said.