KABUL (SW): Downtown Kabul was rocked by hundreds of protesters on Saturday calling for the term “Afghan” and specification of the religion marked on the face of the new Biometric Identity Cards (BICs).
The issue has been lingering for a while now delaying the issuance of BICs in Afghanistan. Leaders of the movement urged the government not to undermine the significance of the nationality while proceeding with the new digitized identity cards.
Hundreds of people on Saturday took to the streets in Kabul to protest the omission of the words Afghan and Islam from new electronic national identity cards.
The protest was led by Mohammad Ismail Yoon, Head of the Afghan National Movement, Anwarul Haq Ahadi, Head of the Afghan Millat Party, Abdul Sattar Saadat, Chief of the Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) and various other politicians. Speakers of the rally criticized National Unity Government NUG leaders for not responding to people’s demand on this issue.
Protesters marched from the Eidgah Mosque to the Pashtunistan Square. Police tried to disperse the protesters with water cannons.
There is growing frustration in Afghanistan that the new government has missed repeated deadlines to introduce new biometric identity cards. The introduction of a new national ID card was first discussed in 2010 following a presidential election in 2009 marred by corruption and violence.
The launch of a biometric ID card was seen as a crucial step towards electoral transparency, as it would contain the information of each registered voter. But a split over the sensitive question of ethnicity has stalled the card’s launch. On one hand are those who feel that only ‘Afghan’ should feature under the card’s nationality field, while others are demanding that one’s specific ethnicity is listed.
There’s also an increasingly vocal group who feel that all references to nationality or ethnicity should be omitted entirely, with only the country’s official name, the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, made visible.
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