The Upper East Regional Directorate of Births and Deaths is appealing to the government to decentralize the printing of birth and death certificates for applicants.
Applicants for birth and death certificates in the region wait for at least two months after application for their documents to be sent to either Kumasi or Accra by an IT officer, who has to stay for a period of two weeks to get the documents signed for the printing.
Speaking to Citi News, during an MBirths (Mobile Births) training in Bolgatanga, Regional Director of Births and Deaths, John Yalmon, said, the situation does not only cause disaffection by applicants but comes at a cost to the department and thus the need to decentralize printing of births and deaths certificates at the regional level.
“The printing of birth and death certificates in Accra or Kumasi is very worrying. Somebody travels from Bolga to Accra to sign a certificate and come back. We have to always send our IT officer from Bolga to Accra to go and stay in Accra for two weeks before he can print them.”
“And I believe as we are doing this, national should be able to make sure that, they decentralize the signing of our certificates because it is the matter of the officers who are concerned to put their signatures on the machines, and it can immediately be printed out, and it is signed and becomes genuine.”
Mr. Yalmon, also bemoaned the low patronage of death certificates in the region and admonished relatives not to wait till it becomes a requirement for insurance or benefit claims before seeking such documents.
He hinted that the region has recorded about 200 deaths as of September 1, 2022, out of a projected 800 deaths by the end of the year.
Mr. Yalmon, disclosed that, inadequate personnel and logistics such as vehicles and motorbikes continue to affect their operations and appealed to government and benevolent organizations to come to their aid.
“The region has 21 registration centers, but our staff strength stands at 17, but with the districts and registries the staff are not enough.
All 15 districts have births and deaths officers, but we need furniture and some offices have their lights cut off. We have only eight motorbikes which cannot cover the 15 districts and municipals, so we are appealing for support”.
The MBirths training workshop for all officers and volunteers was to equip personnel with Information technology skills to clear a backlog of over 8,000 infant births registration in the region onto a national digital platform.
31 tablets have been given to all district and municipal births and deaths offices to ensure that all birth registration backlogs will be transferred onto the MBirths for statistical and policy planning purposes.