Witness statements in an ongoing lawsuit against the government show that the National Registration Department had issued a duplicate of an identity card to an impostor twice, in 1990 and 2004.

According to the witness statement by NRD identity card assistant director Ruslan Alias, the department had issued a high quality plastic identity card (KPT, or better known as kad bunga raya ) to a man who claimed to be plaintiff Mohammad Daud Salleh.

The impostor was issued the KPT in 1990 when he claimed to have lost the earlier version of the identity card (KPP) which was phased out beginning the same year.

However, Ruslan, 53, said the NRD issued another KPT carrying the same number to the plaintiff and actual identity holder when the latter had to upgrade his KPP in 1992.

"In approving the plaintiff's application, the NRD officer would have manually conducted a visual check to know that a KPT had been issued.

"But the officer would not know that it was issued to a different individual. That is why a second KPT was issued to the plaintiff," he said.

Ruslan had yesterday testified at the Kuala Lumpur High Court that the NRD had committed an "error"   in issuing a duplicate of Mohammad Daud's identity card to an impostor in 1990.

NRD knowingly issued two MyKad

In a separate witness statement, the plaintiff said that he was told by the NRD that his MyKad had already been issued to someone else, when he had gone to upgrade his KPT to a MyKad in 2005.

"I was told that my application to upgrade my KPT to a MyKad cannot go through as a MyKad had purportedly been issued to me in 2004.

"I stressed that I had never applied for a MyKad at any NRD office prior to 2005," he said.

He added that when he had gone to the NRD headquarters in Putrajaya to check, he was shown an application for a MyKad in 2004, but the applicant's photograph did not match his face.

"There was no official response by the NRD Putrajaya office and the Home Ministry on my complaint that day, although this was promised to me by the officer who attended to me," he said.

NONE Mohammad Daud (right) , 42, who had testified on Wednesday and Thursday, said that he later received a notice from the NRD that his MyKad, with the 12-digit number issued to him in 1992, was ready and he collected it.

But in 2007 he started receiving notices from banks, the road transport department and city councils, demanding payment for loans which he did not take and compounds for offences he did not commit.

Mohammad Daud, is seeking a court order for the NRD to cancel the identity card issued on Oct 15, 1990 and reimbursement and exemplary damages over the department's "carelessness" that has resulted in fruitless trips to various government agencies to resolve the matter.

The taxi driver named then NRD director-general Kamaruddin Nordin, the current director-general, the home minister and the government as defendants.

The NRD had issued another MyKad with another number to Mohammad Daud in 2009, but the plaintiff rejected it as this would affect his bank accounts, marriage certificate and children's birth certificates.

Acting on behalf of the plaintiff are lawyers Yusfarizal Yussoff and Mohammad Zaid Daud while the government is represented by senior federal counsel Isnan Ishak , Suhaila Harun and three others.

Presiding judge Amelia Tee Abdullah adjourned hearing to Sept 14, with Ruslan set to continue his testimony.

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