H

ome Minister Gamawan Fauzi says the nation’s electronic identity card program (e-ID) will be complete by the end of the year.

While visiting Makassar on Monday, Gamawan said that 70 million people would have their e-IDs by the end of this month, more than the 67 million previously targeted.

“Completion has reached 63 million now, 4 million short of the previous target. But as seen from the perspective of the e-ID data input officers and the public’s enthusiasm in obtaining e-IDs, I’m optimistic that the target of 70 million can be reached by the end of April,” Gamawan said at the South Sulawesi’s governor’s office on Monday.

Gamawan, who was in town to give awards to South Sulawesi Governor Syahrul Yasin Limpo and eight local regents and mayors for their implementation of the program, said that data input officers registered 600,000 applicants every day.

The program was launched last year to crack down on forged ID cards. The e-ID will record the personal information of card holders in central location.

Gamawan repeated a pledge to resign as minister if the e-ID program was not complete by the end of the year. “The e-ID implementation program uses Rp 5.8 trillion [US$682 million] of the budget, which is not a small amount. If it fails to be realized by the end of the year, I hold responsibility and shall step down as home minister,” he said.

However, several local councilors in Central Java said that they doubted that the program would be completed on schedule.

“Many obstacles in the field have yet to be cleared,” Bambang Haryanto, a member of the Central Java Legislative Council, said on Sunday in Semarang as reported by Antara.

Bambang mentioned the late arrival of equipment from Jakarta and power shortages as potential pitfalls in issuing the new ID cards.

Another councilor, Choirul Ikhsan, said that the government had to step up publicity to meet the program’s targets.

Gamawan said he was pleased to observe the enthusiasm at the district administrative office in inputting data for e-ID applicants, who were willing to stand in line until late in the evening, as well as the dedication of the data input officers.

“Residents are willing to stand on line into night. This shows that their spirit of nationalism is very high. We should acknowledge that,” Gamawan said.

Officials estimate that 127 million people have applied for e-ID.

Syahrul said that eight regencies and mayoralties in South Sulawesi had finished recording data for e-ID from 1.7 million of 2.6 million applicants, while the process was still underway in the other 15 regencies and mayoralties in the province and was expected to complete by the end of the year.

He urged people to be more active when reporting the births or deaths of family members so the data could immediately be updated and sent to officials online.