The Director General of National Civil Registration Authority (NCRA), Mohamed Massaquoi, has extolled His Excellency President Dr. Julius Maada Bio as the Champion of Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRSV) in the African continent.

DG Mohamed Massaquoi said the President’s commitment to meeting the UN SDG Target 16.9 by 2030 (provide legal identity for all, including birth registration) has remained steadfast, unwavering and focused.

The DG further expressed gratitude to the Government, EU, UNICEF, Irish Aid, UNDP, UNFPA, Plan International and other development partners for their support to the process of modernizing the CRVS system and gradually moving it from a manual paper-based system to one that is in line with the AU vision to fully digitize CRVS systems across the Continent.

He made the disclosure during the 6th Commemoration of the Africa CRSV Day with the theme for this year: “The potential to increase coverage, improve quality and timeliness of data through digitalization of civil registration systems” held on 10th August, 2023.

“Today is the 6th Annual Commemoration of the Africa Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Day. The Africa CRVS Day was set aside by the African Union as a special commemoration day to reflect and strategize as well as raise consciousness on the relevance of CRVS in modern day.

This is the Sixth Africa CRVS Day celebrated during the 14th year since the establishment of the Africa Programme for Accelerated Improvement for Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (APAI-CRVS). CRVS Day was adopted by the 32nd ordinary Session of the AU Executive Council in 2018 as a vehicle to enhance advocacy on the importance of CRVS Systems for Africa’s growth. It is also an occasion to voice support to country, regional and global commitments to strengthen CRVS Systems and increase stakeholder coordination to maximize available CRVS resources.

This year’s celebration commits African Countries to transform and modernize their CRVS systems though digitalization. Anomaly The theme for this year focuses on digitization and the role it plays in CRVS to provide identity services for the use of governance, health, education, public administration, social protection, requiring identification of citizens and clients to do their businesses” NCRA DG averred.

“As we commemorate the Sixth Africa CRVS Day, African countries are encouraged to advance the digitalization of civil registration data as part of the critical digital public infrastructure to promote the interlinkage and use of Civil Registration and Vital Statistics data and identification data across Government Agencies. Digitalization of the CRVS processes from notification to certification transforms Civil Registration from slow, passive, and reactive systems that depend on in-person attendance to systems that are resilient, proactive and agile. Technology provides the platform for interoperability and real-time data sharing for efficient governance and e-commerce” Massaquoi noted.