600,000 Residents Get Social Security Cards in Ondo

Gov. Olusegun Mimiko

Following their participation in the registration exercise of the state’s Social Security Residency Card Scheme otherwise known as Kaadi Igbeayo, about 600,000 residents of Ondo State will soon begin to enjoy unfettered social services of government.

Disclosing this at the weekend, the Coordinator of the Social Security Residency Card scheme, Mr Tunde Yadeka, said the residency card would serve as an interface in all transactions between the government and residents even as he added that it will allow all residents equal access to governments social and welfare services and allow government at every point to monitor the distribution of such services even to the remotest parts of the state.

“The State Residency Card project is primarily purposed for service delivery management  and not  for identification. The card will make it possible for the collation of information necessary for planning  and executing all kinds of people oriented and welfare projects,” the coordinator said.

Giving an insight into the  process culminating into the execution stage, he  divulged that  the state government in tandem  with global standards and best practice  benchmarks, contacted and  related with  several international agencies in the planning stages of the project adding that the responses of the contacted  organisations , UNDP, DFID  and UNFID,  confirmed  the novelty of the project .

Of particular interest to the international organisations are the objectives of the project, which also include security of lives and properties, effective e-governance and transparency  and accountability in government.
The coordinator disclosed that the first phase of the project was completed with the target  population .

“It commenced with the execution of Prototype Data Gathering at Ifedore local government area in October 2009 and was concluded with data gathering exercises undertaken in 16 other Local Government Areas in December 2010, and the data gathering  exercises  undertaken in  Odigbo Local Government Area in January 2012.

“The second phase was completed  on November 23, 2011,resulting in the computerisation  of 649,995 records of registrants, and the scanned  and indexed images for all the original forms even as the phase three of the project was  concluded in May 2012 resulting in over 70 modules.”

Continuing, he said August 2012 witnessed the issuance stage of the card when it entered the fifth phase with issuance of about 15,000 cards to pregnant women at various Abiye clinics around the state including the Mother and Child Hospital in Oke Aro, Akure adding that issuance had taken place particularly in Akure South, Akure North, and Akoko South-west local government area with an estimated 35,000 women due to receive cards  as expectant mothers.”

Deployments of terminals, he also informed, have also commenced through the training, in collaboration with the Ministry of Health, of about 600 healthcare workers.
Card readers, fingerprint readers, and Computer notebooks the coordinator also said have also been deployed to 190 Healthcare sites across the state.

Governor Olusegun Mimiko-led government had at inception in 2009 promised a reliable and up-to–date  data of all residents in the state as precursor to effective planning  and allocation  of  the scarce resources  available to it .