By Happy Milanzie

Lilongwe, November 4, Mana: The International Organization for Immigration says is committed to training ICT specialists among immigration officers to enhance the capacity of immigration services in the country through digital systems.

This comes following the training of 16 ICT immigration officers to operate the system called Migration and Information Data Analysis System (MIDAS), a system that enables data keeping, tracking and other security issues across the country.

In an interview Nomagugu Ncube, Chief Mission for IOM-Malawi revealed that the training will mark the vision of MIDAS deployment that will help ICT officers to use digital systems by highlighting data, identifying secondary inspection that requires real time reporting.

"We are looking at the vision that the country has in gearing the trade, so the coming in of this initiative will play the pivot role as our immigration officers will be trained on how they can operate the gadget to serve the country," she said.

Ncube emphasized that the system has capacity to address problems that the department was facing and fill the gap of manual data capturing.

In his remarks, Hastings Ngoma, Project Manager in the Ministry of Transport and Trade said the project will help to address the cost of doing business, address some of the major challenges that are in borders across the country and enable smooth running of business.

"The digitalization will soften up the challenges that were being faced by officers to know the numbers of transporters including the goods and services that have been passed in the boarders,” he shared.

Meanwhile, Vivian Kasambo, Commissioner Responsible for Administration in the Department of Immigration and Citizenship said the MIDAS project marks the sign of relief as the project will help in data preservation and ensuring smooth operation of services that are offered timely.

"Immigration is impressed to have this initiative such that will build strong trust worth to the country such that the data can be stored for long period of time," he said.