The government has officially launched a nationwide mass enrolment exercise for National Identity Cards, according to Gen. David Muhoozi, Minister of State for Internal Affairs.
In August 2022, Cabinet approved the Mass Enrolment and Renewal exercise aimed at renewing approximately 15.8 million National ID cards set to expire in June 2025. The initiative also seeks to register an additional 17.2 million Ugandans who have not yet obtained IDs.
“I am pleased to announce that the National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) is ready to begin the pilot phase of the Mass Enrolment and Renewal exercise,” said the minister. “This pilot phase will run from May 2 to May 26, 2025, to allow the Electoral Commission to complete the National Voter Display exercise—an essential process for our democracy and sovereignty.”
The pilot phase commenced with the renewal of IDs for NIRA’s Board of Directors and senior officials from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. During this period, NIRA will conduct registration, renewals, and ID issuance at selected sites in collaboration with key stakeholders.
Starting May 27, 2025, NIRA will scale up operations to the parish level across all 146 administrative districts nationwide.
The minister emphasized that the registration process is free for all citizens acquiring or renewing their national IDs. However, those seeking to change or correct personal details will be charged Shs 200,000, while replacing lost IDs will cost Shs 50,000.
In July 2024, NIRA signed a contract with Tahaluf Al Emarat Technical Solutions to supply 5,665 biometric registration kits. These were fully delivered by January 2025 and distributed countrywide starting February 2025.
The procurement also included high-capacity card production machines capable of printing up to 100,000 laser-engraved cards daily, data center infrastructure (including five racks, 80 servers, firewalls, and communication equipment), and a new National Security Information System based on the Modular Open-Source Identification Platform (MOSIP).
The upgraded system supports online pre-registration of biographical data and introduces iris scanning as an additional biometric identifier. Biometric data will be captured only at designated registration centers by authorized NIRA officers. The online pre-registration link will be accessible via the NIRA website starting May 27, 2025.
