Koaralaippattu North residents not issued NICs

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 March 2008, 02:45 GMT]
More than sixty percent of the people residing in the area belonging to 16 Grama Sevaka (GS) divisions under the administration of District Secretariat of Koararalippattu North, Batticaloa, have not received their National Identity Cards (NIC), according to statistics released by the Secretariat. Without the NICs, youths are targets for arrest by Sri Lanka security forces, civil society sources said.

21,741 people reside in this area, and residents of all ages face difficulties without the NICs.

District Secretary (DS) issued temporary IDs to 1400 eligible voters from this region to enable them to vote in Monday’s local council elections, civil society sources said.

National Identity cards is necessary for civilians including youths who travel to various places in search of jobs. When the youths travel to Polonnaruwa, Kathirwela, Welikanda and, Mannampitity seeking employment they often get arrested and accused of having links with Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), sources added.

Apart from delay in registering at the office of the Registrar of Births the of children born in this DS area, delay in issuing Birth certificates, destruction of documents during the displacement of civilians in 1994 and 2006 due to military offensives, the lack of interest of the locals is also said to be another reason for the delay in issuing the identity cards, sources in the region said.

Last year on 14 October, a mobile NIC service was held at the office of Vaaharai DS and the cases of 277 who had applied for renewal of their identity cards was resolved the same day. However, it is learnt that the applications of many sent to the office of the Registrar of Persons in Colombo still remain unprocessed.