A digital form of Ghana’s national ID card, called the Ghana Card, will be released next year by Margins ID, the company that makes the physical Ghana Card.
In a recent interview with tech news site media, Moses Baiden, CEO of Margins ID Group, said that the digital version will have all the same features and functions as the physical card. The information about the users will be stored on a chip in their devices and accessed through a mobile app.
Margins ID Group will also make a digital ID that can be used on an app. They already make NFC readers who can read all Ghana Cards, whether online or offline.
Read also: Kenya to launch digital national identity cards
Ghana Card for payments
Baiden said this would make it easier to verify and authenticate someone’s name even if they don’t have their physical Ghana Card, either because they forgot to bring it with them or it got lost or damaged.
Baiden says that the digital version of the Ghana Card won’t replace the physical card because he thinks that Ghana, being a developing country, doesn’t have all the facilities needed to check digital IDs everywhere in the country yet.
According to the official, “the digital ID can be a good addition to the physical Ghana Card, but we are not yet at the stage where we can get rid of the physical card and go completely digital.” It is because the number of people in Ghana who own cell phones is growing.
Baiden also said that next year, another critical digital feature currently dormant on the physical version of the Ghana Card will be activated: an app for digital transfers. He said that this is one of 18 features on the ID card that have not been turned on yet because the correct laws are not in place.
Pre-Financing by Margins
Margins ID Group officials also recalled the Ghanaian government spending a lot of money on a foreign contractor to deliver a national ID card system “that does not work,” stressing that an ID provider must have the cash to succeed. Pakistan’s NADRA, Nigeria’s NIMC, and India’s UIDAI can teach digital ID funding sustainability.
Baiden said Margins ID has pre-financed Ghanaian ID card production for over a decade despite unpaid obligations. He said Ghana saved $1.5 billion by introducing the Ghana Card, which state entities would have used to collect data for government services.
Given the Ghana Card’s growing use cases, he believes it can boost Ghana’s development economy by providing access to a wide range of services. Recently, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia announced the Ghana Card will underlie an auto loans scheme.