PSA aims to reprint, release in June national IDs burned in post office fire
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, June 1) — The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said on Thursday that it targets to reprint and release this month around 7,500 national IDs that were burned during the Manila Central Post Office fire over a week ago.
During a public briefing, PSA Deputy National Statistician Fred Sollesta clarified that the destroyed cards were only for residents of the City of Manila.
He said the Manila Central Post Office was not a repository of all the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP)-printed ID cards.
"They (PhilPost) have already forwarded the information, data kung anong cards ang affected and tini-trigger na namin ang reprinting sa BSP. We target that some time in June, mare-release na namin ‘yan sa PhilPost para ma-deliver sa registrants," Sollesta said during the Laging Handa briefing aired over the state-run PTV.
[Translation: They have already forwarded the information and data on which cards were affected, and the BSP will reprint these. We target that some time in June, we will be able to release the IDs to PhilPost which will deliver them to registrants.]
Meanwhile, the PSA said around 79.12 million Filipinos have already registered for the national ID, and 76.17 million have been assigned a PhilSys number.
As of May 30, the BSP has already printed 37.73 million ID cards which were turned over to PhilPost for delivery. PhilPost has already delivered around 32 million.
To address the backlog, the PSA issued over 34 million paper-printed e-Phil IDs as an alternative while registrants await their actual card.
Sollesta said they may catch up with their backlogs and finish the printing of the actual national IDs by next year.
The PSA earlier admitted the backlog grew after the agency was mandated to register 70 million Filipinos before the end of the Duterte administration.
The agency said the initial plan was a slow rollout, with around 20 to 25 million registration per year.
With the overwhelming number of registrants, the PSA earlier said the printing of IDs became the chokepoint of the process.
