Former President Jerry John Rawlings alongside John Agyekum Kufuor registered for his Ghana card on Tuesday despite a boycott of the exercise by the NDC Minority in Parliament.

Speaking in a radio interview with Citi FM Tuesday evening, however, Sam George indicated that Mr. Rawlings would not have registered if he had actively engaged the Minority and listened to their concerns.

“I believe if President Rawlings had asked us as a Minority to explain and expatiate what our challenges are, he would have appreciated our position better and possibly aligned more with us, but unfortunately he did not grant us audience to explain.”

“President Rawlings did not hear us as a Minority or a party. On the basis of the foregoing, he was led mistakenly to believe that the NIA’S position is tenable. I believe that if President Rawlings seeks or demands audience from the Minority and we go before him with the evidence that we have, he will take a position in the interest of Ghanaians.”

Asked whether Mr. Rawlings could be sanctioned for going against the position of the party, Mr. Sam George said “it falls within the leadership of the party to take whatever action or inaction against any person who has chosen to go anti the position. We as a party cannot compel ordinary members.”

He was however quick to add that the party can “choose to lay a marker and say that if you go against the party’s position, these are possible sanctions of taking that line. That rests is within the bosom of the leader of the party.”

The minority not opposed to Ghana card

He further clarified that the Minority is not opposed to the Ghana card as widely suggested.

“Minority is not against the issuance of the Ghana card. We are not fundamentally opposed to the Ghana card. All we are saying is the issuance of Ghana card must be inclusive of everyone.”

NIA engages Rawlings, Kufuor on Ghana card

The Chief Executive Officer of the NIA, Prof. Ken Attafuah also told Citi FM that, the registration of the former presidents Jerry John Rawlings and John Kufuor was part of the early Ghana card registration process.

He added that the NIA will continue to register staff of other critical institutions as part of the early registration process.

“We had stakeholder engagements with President Rawlings and President Kufuor and today we’ve had the privilege of registering the two gallant men. We are in the process of registering Ghanaians and these two are very eminent Ghanaians. We are registering other Ghanaians today. We are at the premises of the audit service, judicial service, immigration, prisons fire service and several other places. We are determined to stay focused and to continue with discharging our statutory mandate.

President Akufo-Addo and other staff at the presidency were registered earlier this month after an initial unsuccessful attempt.
About the National ID card

The issuance of a National Identification ID card is among the government’s key promises to formalize the country’s economy.

Under the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government in 2009, the NIA began the process to register and issue the National ID card to all Ghanaians.

About 11 million people in six regions of the country were registered as part of the process between 2009 and 2010.

The cards were, however, ready for collection later in 2011, although a number of them could not be accessed.

credit: Citinewsroom

But most banks and some state institutions rendered them useless as they rejected them as an unrecognized state ID card.