Residency permits, labour cards and the national ID will be merged into one card - and a single applicationprocess - from next July.
"There are too many hurdles for people to go through when they come and settle in the country," Dr Ali al Khouri, the acting director of the Emirates Identity Authority said yesterday. "This new process will consolidate three major steps into one."
Those steps are overseen by the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Labour and the authority.
Each ministry will still be responsible for approving applications in its area, but the application process will be overseen entirely by the authority.
"Each of these require their own application forms," said Dr al Khouri. "So you have to fill three forms and three different payments. That's too much."
Currently, those processes require trips to several different offices around the city. Under the new system, however, applicants will go to one of the authority's offices and fill out a single form.
After medical tests at Sheikh Khalifa Medical Centre, they would return to the original office and be assigned a date to return to pick up their unified card.
"You will be given an appointment for when to come back and pick up your card. Our goal is reduce this time to 15 minutes," said Dr al Khouri.
"We will start with newcomers as it is more practical. They will be required to fill one application form and make one payment. So when they go to the preventive medicine [at Sheikh Khalifa Medical Centre] to get tested, they will have their fingerprints taken, iris scan and facial biometrics."
For those who already hold national ID cards, no additional action will be needed, Dr al Khouri said.
Those cards will be linked to residency and labour permits, although he could not provide a specific date for that integration.
The existing offices for obtaining the national ID card - there are 20 nationwide - will be able to scan all submitted documents and transmit the data to a separate office that will check all the information against a Ministry of Interior database, he said.
Those entering the country will also have their irises scanned at airports and border crossings.
Besides streamlining the process for residents, the new processes will also play an important role for the Government, he said.
Officials also believe that consolidating all the information into a unified database will help in solving and preventing crime, as well as help authorities plan public services.
The database will be accessible to the Ministry of Interior and police, the Ministry of Labour and the Emirates Identity Authority.
"This has more to do with serving the public. A major part of serving the public is also protecting them," Dr al Khouri said.
"Once a national database is complete we will make better decisions, offer better services and customise our planning."
The recently announced national DNA database, which is scheduled to be deployed within a year by the Ministry of Interior for fighting crime, would not have much impact on the national ID system, Dr al Khouri said.
"We have explored the issue of consolidating the DNA database with the national ID, but we agreed that at this stage we will not be doing that. The vision is to have one prime database."
The gathering of such information about individuals has raised privacy issues and illustrated the differing views among the different nationalities here.
"There is a huge debate about privacy. People were asking, 'Why do we need another card?' We already have passports, but passports are a travel document.
"We need to come to terms that a national ID is a part of the Government's strategy to offer better services and safeguard the public."
When the card was first introduced, Dr al Khouri said, it was not popular.
"I will admit that we did not market the card properly at the outset. So now we are wanting to market it in such a way that shows how beneficial it is for people to have."
Although Dr al Khouri has declined to give any figures on how many expatriates and nationals have registered for the card to date, he said: "There is great progress, I will say that. Instead of forcing people to get the card we are now marketing what it can do."
Last week, Dr al Khouri represented the country at the FutureGov 2009 Summit in Bali, where the national ID programme was recognised as one of the top five government projects in Asia.
myoussef@thenational.ae
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
In numbers: China in Dubai
The number of Chinese people living in Dubai: An estimated 200,000
Number of Chinese people in International City: Almost 50,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2018/19: 120,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2010: 20,000
Percentage increase in visitors in eight years: 500 per cent
WITHIN%20SAND
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if you go
The flights
Air France offer flights from Dubai and Abu Dhabi to Cayenne, connecting in Paris from Dh7,300.
The tour
Cox & Kings (coxandkings.com) has a 14-night Hidden Guianas tour of Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana. It includes accommodation, domestic flights, transfers, a local tour manager and guided sightseeing. Contact for price.
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
PULITZER PRIZE 2020 WINNERS
JOURNALISM
Public Service
Anchorage Daily News in collaboration with ProPublica
Breaking News Reporting
Staff of The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky.
Investigative Reporting
Brian M. Rosenthal of The New York Times
Explanatory Reporting
Staff of The Washington Post
Local Reporting
Staff of The Baltimore Sun
National Reporting
T. Christian Miller, Megan Rose and Robert Faturechi of ProPublica
and
Dominic Gates, Steve Miletich, Mike Baker and Lewis Kamb of The Seattle Times
International Reporting
Staff of The New York Times
Feature Writing
Ben Taub of The New Yorker
Commentary
Nikole Hannah-Jones of The New York Times
Criticism
Christopher Knight of the Los Angeles Times
Editorial Writing
Jeffery Gerritt of the Palestine (Tx.) Herald-Press
Editorial Cartooning
Barry Blitt, contributor, The New Yorker
Breaking News Photography
Photography Staff of Reuters
Feature Photography
Channi Anand, Mukhtar Khan and Dar Yasin of the Associated Press
Audio Reporting
Staff of This American Life with Molly O’Toole of the Los Angeles Times and Emily Green, freelancer, Vice News for “The Out Crowd”
LETTERS AND DRAMA
Fiction
"The Nickel Boys" by Colson Whitehead (Doubleday)
Drama
"A Strange Loop" by Michael R. Jackson
History
"Sweet Taste of Liberty: A True Story of Slavery and Restitution in America" by W. Caleb McDaniel (Oxford University Press)
Biography
"Sontag: Her Life and Work" by Benjamin Moser (Ecco/HarperCollins)
Poetry
"The Tradition" by Jericho Brown (Copper Canyon Press)
General Nonfiction
"The Undying: Pain, Vulnerability, Mortality, Medicine, Art, Time, Dreams, Data, Exhaustion, Cancer, and Care" by Anne Boyer (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
and
"The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America" by Greg Grandin (Metropolitan Books)
Music
"The Central Park Five" by Anthony Davis, premiered by Long Beach Opera on June 15, 2019
Special Citation
Ida B. Wells
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
Opening Premier League fixtures, August 14
- Brentford v Arsenal
- Burnley v Brighton
- Chelsea v Crystal Palace
- Everton v Southampton
- Leicester City v Wolves
- Manchester United v Leeds United
- Newcastle United v West Ham United
- Norwich City v Liverpool
- Tottenham v Manchester City
- Watford v Aston Villa
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Specs
Engine: 51.5kW electric motor
Range: 400km
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Torque: 175Nm
Price: From Dh98,800
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Match info
Uefa Champions League Group B
Tottenham Hotspur 1 (Eriksen 80')
Inter Milan 0
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