Minister of Interior Sar Kheng has sent a new set of procedures to local authorities aimed at speeding up the sluggish process of issuing new IDs.

Local officials are ordered in the letter, dated January 13 and posted to the ministry’s website over the weekend, to implement the changes to the “highest effectiveness from the date of signing”.

Applicants for the new IDs, which authorities are rushing to issue ahead of the 2017 and 2018 commune and national elections, had been turned off by the difficulty justifying to authorities small discrepancies between the multiple documents required for applying, a recent visit to a Phnom Penh application centre found.

In order to streamline the documents required, the new rules stipulate that applicants need only bring a birth certificate and any official document confirming their citizenship. In addition, applicants need one witness, also with a family book, from their commune to confirm residency.

Chan Kemseng, deputy director of the General Department of Identification, said yesterday that people’s reluctance to apply was the greatest remaining obstacle to the process.