Sen. Grace Poe on Sunday called on the public to give the SIM Registration law one final push as the deadline to register approaches.
“Let’s spread the word that all must enlist their SIM for their protection and peace of mind,” she said.
Poe noted that the government and telcos should go all out to encourage our countrymen to register.
“This should be matched with a fortified infrastructure to handle thegush of transactions from those who will sign up their SIM,” said Poe.
She reiterated that systems are in place to secure our information andprotect our data.
“In our SIM number, there should be no goodbye. We just have forever,” she stated.
Similarly, Camarines Sur Rep. LRay Villafuerte urged the Department of Information and Communications Technology to extend for a month or two the sign-up of SIM card registration, saying holders of over 100 million SIM numbers have yet to list up as the April 26 registration deadline nears.
He reminded the DICT that a non-extension of the four-month registration period would mean the automatic deactivation the day after of the SIM numbers of subscribers who fail to beat the original registration deadline set by Republic Act 11934, or the SIM Registration Act.
Villafuerte is one of the authors of RA 11934.
“This is an 11th-hour appeal to the DICT to stretch the SIM registration period by a month or two to avoid shutting out from digital and financial inclusion the legion of Filipinos who legitimately own possibly most of the 100 million-plus still-unregistered SIMs at this point,” he said.
“A non-extension of the registration period will have led to the disenfranchisement come Wednesday of the legion of legit SIM owners who fail to beat the deadline for the sign-up, thereby dealing a severe blow to the Marcos Jr. administration’s efforts to fast track our country’s digital transformation,” he added.
The financial and digital exclusion from cyberspace of the countless people in possession of the unregistered SIMs would happen, Villafuerte cited.
DICT Secretary Ivan John Uy said he would meet with the representatives of the public telecommunications entities (PTEs) and other stakeholders on April 24 to identify gaps in the SIM registration process.
As of April 20, or a week before the deadline, the National Telecommunications Center website reported that 76.92 million SIM owners or 45.79% had signed.
Of the 76.92 million registrants, 37.45 million signed up with Smart Communications Inc. as of last Thursday, another 33.93 million with Globe Telecom Inc., and 5.53 million more with DITO Telecommunity Corp.
“In separately appealing for an extension, the three PTEs—Smart, Globe and DITO —/told the DICT and NTC that many legitimate SIM holders have possibly failed to register their SIMs over the four-month sign-up period because of their lack of the required ID cards for them to list up or because of digital challenges such as the poor connectivity or no Internet at all, especially in the so-called ‘missionary’ or faraway places across the country,” Villafuerte said.