Uganda’s national ID renewal exercise is making steady progress, with over 10 million citizens already renewing their IDs.
The National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) launched the mass renewal and registration exercise in May this year, aiming to benefit over 33 million Ugandans.
The exercise targets 15.8 million citizens whose National IDs expired in June 2025, as well as 17.2 million citizens who have never been registered.
While the renewal exercise is going strong, registration numbers have stagnated.
Christopher Kantinti, Director of the ICT Department at NIRA, attributes this to the recent school holiday.
“The biggest population we target for registration is children, and they were out of school. Now that schools have resumed, we are working with the Minister of Education to reach these children and register them for national IDs.” He said during a media breakfast meeting organized to mark the International ID day held on Tuesday at NIRA Head office in Kololo
Clare Olama, Registrar at NIRA, has urged citizens to take advantage of the remaining time to register or renew their national IDs. “We are in the evening of this mass drive at your parish, and I want to call on everybody who has not made the choice to enroll or to register to please do the same while we are still at the parish,” Olama said.
Olama warned that failing to register would limit access to essential services. “We want to implore Ugandans that by choosing not to be registered, you lock yourself out of service access,” she said.
The mass renewal and registration exercise, which commenced on May 27th, 2025, is expected to run for six months.