Marcos to PSA: Expedite printing of digital national ID

MANILA, Philippines — President Marcos has ordered the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) to expedite the printing of the digital version of the national identification cards as the agency struggles to meet its target in the distribution of physical cards.

Marcos made the directive during a meeting with National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) Secretary Arsenio Balisacan and PSA officials, led by Undersecretary Dennis Mapa, at Malacañang yesterday, where they tackled issues surrounding the rollout of the Philippine Identification System (PhilSys) ID.

“Let us print out as much as we can, and then let’s issue the physical ID as soon as we can,” the President said, referring to the electronic Philippine ID or ePhilID, the digital equivalent of the national ID.

In a statement late last month, the PSA said it has printed more than 3.6 million ePhilIDs.

The government agencies in charge of the PhilSys ID project are the PSA, the NEDA and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

Mapa told Marcos that the PSA continues to work with the BSP in further expediting and boosting the volume of Phil ID production and printing.

The printing issues were attributed to the “late start of the flow of data and the volume of the data, which is less than what is supposed to be,” according to a statement released by the Office of the Press Secretary yesterday.

These problems, however, have been rectified, according to Mapa.

Lawmakers earlier grilled the PSA over its supposed negligence in distributing national IDs, which would allow faster and seamless transactions in accessing financial and social protection services.

The PSA head earlier blamed the influx of registrants in the PhilSys for the delay in the printing of national ID cards.