The Philippine Identification System (PhilSys) is gaining ground with up to 6.4 million Filipinos – mostly from low-income families – have already completed the Step 2 phase of the registration process.

This was the report of National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua to President Rodrigo Duterte during the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) meeting Monday evening (May 3), live-streamed over the government-run PTV network.

Chua said of the 6.4 million Step 2 finishers, 2.2 million have submitted their documents required for the opening of a bank account with the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP).

He also confirmed that of the 2.2 million, 806,000 have successfully opened an LBP bank account.

“Yung 2.2 million on board na mga documents nila for the opening of bank account, at 806,000 na ang nagbukas ng bank account (For the 2.2 million registrants, their documents are already on board for the opening of bank account, while 806,000 have already opened a bank account),” Chua said.

He added that PhilSys registration progress even surpassed targets, with 77 out of the 86 provinces in the country currently undergoing the Step 1 registration while some have already proceeded with Step 2.

As of May 3, a total of 33.4 million individuals have already completed Step 1, which started in October last year.

He said registration for Step 3 will start this month, noting that there were some who have already finished step 3 and were already given their ID card.

Given the impressive achievements of PhilSys implementation, Chua said he is optimistic they could achieve the targeted 50 to 70 million individuals who should be registered for PhilSys by the end of the year.

The online registration, which will resume after fixing some technical problems, is seen to further boost the number of PhilSys registrants given the overwhelming interest of Filipinos to have a PhilID, Chua said.

The online portal was down since its pilot testing on April 30 after over 46,000 individuals tried to use the portal to register for Step 1, which is way above the targeted 16,000 simultaneous users to be tested per minute that day, Chua said.

Signed into law by President Rodrigo R. Duterte in August 2018, Republic Act 11055, or the Philippine Identification System Act, aims to establish a single national ID for all Filipinos and resident aliens.

The national ID shall be a valid proof of identity that shall be a means of simplifying public and private transactions, enrollment in schools, and the opening of bank accounts.

It will also boost efficiency, especially in dealing with government services where people will only need to present one ID during transactions. (PNA)