Colombo: Ahead of the January 26 Presidential
poll, Sri Lanka today said it will issue one lakh identity
cards to voters, including Tamil civilians displaced in the
civil strife, in the next three weeks.
The Department for Registrations of Persons will issue
the cards in next three weeks after Elections Secretariat
reported around one lakh people do not possess even temporary
I-cards, Commissioner for the Department of Registration of
Persons A G Dharmadasa said in a statement.
The move comes after Election chief of Sri Lanka made it
mandatory to have national identity card in order to cast vote
in the upcoming polls where incumbent President Mahinda
Rajapaksa will contest against former Army General and common
opposition candidate Sarath Fonseka.
Urgent measures have been put in place and officials
would expedite the granting of identity cards to those who do
not possess it, he said.
"The Department is working round-the-clock to process
National Identity Cards," Dharmadasa said.
The Sri Lankan Elections office has asked all Grama
Niladaris in rural areas, especially where Internally
Displaced Persons (IDPs) are living, to remain at their
offices at least three to four days a week until January 26 to
issue temporary identity cards.
It said the support of Grama Niladaris is vital to speed
up the issuing of identity cards.
"An announcement on the issue of temporary IDs will be
made to the media by Elections Chief Dayananda Dissanayaka
towards the middle of the week," the state-owned `Sunday
Observer` reported quoting P M Siriwardana, Elections
Department Deputy Commissioner.
A senior Elections Department official said large number
of applications were submitted for temporary IDs from the
north and east but were rejected due to lack of correct
information, the newspaper reported.
"Proper counselling services should be carried out for
IDPs when filling their applications for temporary IDs," the
Election Department official said.
He also said that voters who do not possess valid NICs
could use the passport, the driving licence, the Government
service pension identity card, elders identity card or the
identity card issued to clergy by the DRP to cast vote.
Already over 20,000 Internally Displaced Persons in the
Menik Farm welfare village in Vavuniya in the north have
applied for voting in the forthcoming presidential election.
Minister of Resettlement and Disaster Relief Services,
Risath Bathiyutheen said that Grama Seva officers at the
welfare centres assisted the IDPs to fill in their
applications to enable them to cast their votes.
Over 25,000 Muslim IDPs have applied to vote at the
elections from the Puttalam district in west coast of Sri
Lanka.
PTI
