Burkina/Pensioners: CARFO officially launches biometric enrolment

The Caisse autonome de retraite des fonctionnaires du Burkina Faso (CARFO) has officially launched the biometric enrolment of pensioners. The launch ceremony took place this Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Ouagadougou. It was presided over by the Minister of State for the Civil Service, Bassolma Bazié.

Biometric enrolment is a process that involves collecting a person's biometric data for identification and authentication purposes, according to the Minister in charge of digital transition, Aminata Zerbo. The implementation of this program was made possible thanks to funding from the World Bank through the "Projet d'appui à l'inclusion financière et l'accès au financement des petites et moyennes entreprises". The funding amounts to over 750 million CFA francs.

This biometric enrolment campaign will involve some 53,000 pensioners throughout the country and abroad. It will last four months.

This biometric reform project, which stems from the authorities' desire to offer quality services to the population, will undoubtedly have a positive impact on the services offered by CARFO to its policyholders. It is part of the government's digitization policy, promoted by the ministry in charge of digital transition.

According to Minister of State Bassolma Bazié, this project will not only improve the services offered to pensioners, but will also enable us to clean up the pensioner database, combat fraud and improve the quality of our services.According to Minister of State Bassolma Bazié, the new system will help to clean up the pensioners' database, combat fraud and identity falsification, protect the benefits payment system and safeguard pensioners' rights by ensuring that the right entitlement is paid to the right person.

Minister Bazié explained that the biometric reform will take place in three phases: the equipment and software acquisition and installation phase, the pensioner enrolment phase, and the operations phase. "The enrolment system set up includes 20 mobile enrolment stations with the capacity to enrol around 1,300 pensioners per day", noted the head of the department in charge of the civil service.

According to Minister Zerbo, the question of identification is a general problem that the government has already tackled through the project for unique electronic identification of individuals. CARFO's initiative is therefore in line with this project. To this end, there will be a synergy of actions so that this enrolment operation can also be used within the framework of this project," she announced.

The Minister in charge of digital transition also stressed that Burkina Faso is resolutely committed to making a success of its digital transition. In order to boost its economy, modernize its public administration through the dematerialization of services to make it more productive, more efficient, more transparent, more accessible and closer to the people.

"Our country must therefore be able to use digital tools, which are a formidable tool for resilience, to bring people closer together through electronic communication, to help those in need with mobile payments, and to provide people with services that can be accessed remotely," said Madame Zerbo.

"This reform aims to help pensioners. By including these biometric data in our database, we will now be able to secure our database. When we talk about fingerprints, this avoids fraud, all kinds of falsifications and guarantees the uniqueness of the pensioner in our database. The reform is set to continue. In the years to come, even from a distance, we'll be able to recognize pensioners by facial recognition or fingerprints, via their cell phones and even from home. This will also greatly reduce waiting times for physical checks," says CARFO General Manager Hyacinthe Tamalgo.

Source: lefaso.net