PNG NID card used to purchase Chinese SIM cards

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Despite negative comments about Papua New Guinea’s National Identity Card (NID), there is positive news on this piece of important item.

In China last December – 12 Pacific Island journalists, were there for a weeklong China-Pacific journalist program, organised by the China Foreign Affairs for familiariasation through their respective embassies.

It was a very tough but rewarding one week, as almost all of these scribes were “incommunicable”, all of which had their dose of Facebook and Whatsapp crippled for a week.

The trip was to Beijing, Shenzen and Gunangzhou, and to get a new SIM card in China you needed a formal identity card.

Sad to say that everyone’s passports was not valid to get a Chinese SIM card.

What magic it was – when Gorethy Kenneth (pictured) produced her PNG-issued NID card to China Mobile and China Telecom. It was automatically accepted – the lights to their computers or whatever went green!

A SIM card cost 200 Yuan for one – this NID card was allowed five SIM cards. We purchased two – one for EMTV reporter Merilyne Kolokai, who was also on the trip. Only two of us were able to communicate with PNG and around the Pacific.

Like all Pacific Islanders do – these two mobile phones were being sent around to whoever needed to make a call back home.

So there, PNG’s NID card is recognised on the global stage, as a legal identity card. By Kelly Doven

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