In March 2024, The National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA), advertised 10,594 Registration Assistants NIRA jobs. The Registration Assistants would be responsible for accurate recording of applicants’ information and exercising control over the registration processes at the registration center.
Consequently, a number of people applied and submitted their applications online . Only short-listed candidates were promised to be contacted. NIRA firmly stated that any form of canvassing or lobbying would lead to disqualification.
Last week, rumors circulated about how the shortlist was out and some people had been contacted. Since this wasn’t happening on a large scale, the few who were contacted assumed they were being scammed. Those contacted received messages asking them to report for interviews on Wednesday, April 10, 2024.
When are the NIRA Jobs shortlists coming out?
The fact that the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) released its own shortlist of Census Enumerators and Supervisors raised hopes that NIRA would do the same. A few people were contacted by individuals alleging to work with NIRA. These claims were rightfully doubted.
However, on Monday, April 9, Peter Okwalinga Jr., who appears to be affiliated with NIRA, posted on his X (formerly Twitter) account: “Today @NIRA_Ug commences competence tests for Registration Assistants, applicants in the districts of North & West Nile. The shortlisted applicants were contacted either by phone, email, or both. This is a phased exercise, other regions will follow.”
This post finally served as a form of confirmation. In fact, a number of people responded to the post, most thanking him for the update and requesting him to tell NIRA administrators to do the same. It seems he did, because shortly after, a NIRA official X account retweeted Peter Okwalinga Jr.’s tweets about the shortlists and ongoing interviews.
NIRA Jobs Shortlists and Interviews to be in Phases
According to Peter Okwalinga Jr., only applicants whose submissions met the requirements stated in the advertisement were contacted. The same will apply to subsequent regions/districts.
Best wishes to citizens who expressed interest in being Registration Assistants. The @NIRA_Ug HR technical team went through the applications and those in the North and West Nile who met the requirements were contacted to do their competence tests today at their respective locations.
He added that interviews for other regions will follow next in phases. He advised applicants to exercise the same patience they did when they submitted and waited for a response.
There was a technical issue where applicants were randomly assigned to Kole District as their preferred area of work. Thankfully, NIRA acted swiftly and gave such applicants a chance to rectify their information and prepare for the exercise.
About NIRA Uganda
The National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) was established by the Registration of Persons Act (ROPA), 2015 and is mandated to establish and maintain the National Identification Register (NIR). The Authority is also charged with, among others: the registration of citizens and legally resident aliens; assigning National Identification / Alien Identification Numbers (NINs/AINS) to qualifying persons and issuing Identification Cards to those 16 years and above; registration of births, deaths and adoption orders and issuance of the relevant certificates.
The first release of National Identification Cards in Uganda was issued in 2014 with a validity of ten (10) years. NIRA intends to conduct a mass renewal and mass enrolment exercise for all expired cards and unregistered citizens. Section 66 of the Registration of Persons Act, 2015 makes possession of a National Identification Card or National Identification Number (NIN) a mandatory requirement for people to access public services.