MANILA – A total of 74.2 million Filipinos have so far registered for the National ID with about 22 million cards already produced and 17.6 million delivered by PhilPost, the Philippine Statistics Authority said Friday.

Fred Sollesta, director of the PSA Civil Registration System - Information Technology Project, said it is committed to working with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to produce more electronic and physical copies of the Philippine National ID by the end of the year.

“Nagcommit yung PSA na by end of 2022, maka-issue kami ng 50 million credentials. Kasi combination ‘to siya ng physical card, yung napoproduce sa BSP and then yung e-PhilID, yung digital version but in printed copy na mag-complement doon sa physical card--around 20 million of that,” he said.

(The PSA has committed to produce about 50 million credentials by the end of 2022. This is a combination of the physical cards produced by BSP and the e-PhilID, the digital version but in printed copy that complements the physical ID--around 20 million of that.)

“And by the end of the year yung card na napo-produce sa BSP ay around 30 million ,so 50 million yung i-produce namin o i-deliver sa end of 2022, and then mga around 90 million end of June 2023,” he added.

(And by the end of the year BSP commits to produce about 30 million, so we can deliver 50 million by the end of 2022, and then around 90 million end of June 2023.)

He also explained why the printing of the National ID is facing delays.

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“Yung kadahilanan nito ay nung nagstart tayo ng national ID, dapat 5-year project ito. Nung time ng administration ni President Duterte, na gusto niya, na by the end ng kanyang term makapagparehistro kami ng PSA ng 70 million. So in a span of one and half years, nagawa yan ng PSA, pero yung sa side ng processing, ng card production, naka-design siya talaga na 5 years.”

“So yung ano mo, yung challenge na na kumbaga, na-choke siya sa dahil hindi pantay yung registration tsaka yung card production and processing,” he said.

(When we started this project, it was supposed to be a 5-year project. But under former President Rodrigo Duterte's administration, he said he wanted PSA ro register 70 million Filipinos by the end of his term. So the PSA did that. But the card production design was really set for 5 years. So that's the challenge--there was chokepoint because there was an imbalance in the registration and processing.)

He noted, however, that there is a way for the public to track the status of their National ID.

“Pwede natin ma-check yung status ng card ko basta nandoon yung transaction slip na binigay saýo, magpaparehas, titingnan natin yan and makita din yan sa tracker ng PhilPost kung natanggap na nila for delivery.”

(You can check the status of your card using the data on your transaction slip. You can check it in the tracker on the PhilPost website to see if it has been picked up.)

--TeleRadyo, 21 October 2022