Notwithstanding the billions of naira spent on the National Identity Management System (NIMS), the process remains inconclusive, hindering the ability of government to carry out adequate planning which was one of the reasons for the commencement of the compulsory registration for National Identity Numbers (NIN).
Stakeholders are of the view that if the National Identity System is conducted properly and is well syncronised with other data collected by other organisations, the National Identity Database could help government planning, policy and budget allocation for the various economic sectors, as well as age groups, gender, geographic locations, weather, security and other strategic considerations.
“The absence of unique identity numbers for every citizen in Nigeria may have been a contributory factor to the underdevelopment of certain services and industries in the country. For instance, the growth of consumer credit may have been stymied by the absence of a unique means of identification of citizens, which in turn created room for high delinquency rate of consumers, as well as lenders unwillingness to advance credit to individuals without tangible collateral,” Johnson Chukwu, MD/CEO of Cowry Asset Management Limited told BusinessDay.
Chukwu who is also a member of the Nigerian Stock Exchange, said Nigeria lacks a good credit system because of the absence of National Identity numbers.
”At the macro-economic level, consumer credit can be used as a tool for stimulating economic growth. When the monetary authorities lower benchmark rates, consumers are encouraged to borrow and increase their consumption, which engenders increase in demand and consequent increase in production, employment and income.
“Industries such as vehicle manufacturing strive in markets where there is strong demand, which in most cases is dependent on the availability of consumer credit. It then follows that a country like Nigeria without a developed consumer credit market cannot realise its full growth potential, as it lacks one of the tools for economic stimulation.”
Hadiza Dagabana, general manager, legal services, at NIMC said the commission had planned to ensure the mandatory use of the National Identity Numbers by September, 1 2015. However, several months later, most Nigerians are yet to be issued with NINs
“The commission is taking steps to ensure the mandatory use of National Identity Numbers (NIN) according to the Act which stipulates that transactions including applications for, and issuance of international passports; opening of individual and/or group bank accounts, all consumer credit; purchase of insurance policies; the purchase, transfer and registration of land by any individual; National Health Insurance Scheme, such transactions that have social security implications, registration of voters, payment of taxes, and pensions, etc., will be done with the NIN, beginning from September 1, 2015,” Dagabana had earlier said.
The commission later announced that as from January 9 2016, it would commence a drive to enforce the request and use of the number by relevant agencies.
Dabagana said the decision to allow more time before enforcement was to provide an enabling environment for the commission to leverage on the new drive to aggregate demographic and biometric databases from relevant MDAs and harmonise them.
On January 8 this year, through an official press release, the commission stated that it was yet to enforce the use of National Identity Numbers.
“Enforcement of compliance will be announced to the general public after NIMC has concluded ongoing review of its strategy on compliance,” it read.
The purpose of the National Identity Number is to easily identify every Nigerian citizen, curb identity theft and ensure that every individual is given their entitlement, based on their genuine identity.
Apart from the quest to warehouse the profile of all Nigerians for effective national planning, the need for synergy with other data management organisations, such as the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) registration, Bank Verification Number (BVN), voters’ card etc, in virtually all sectors of the economy, is of utmost importance, as this would make it easier for government to plan and channel adequate attention to areas such as education, pensions, jobs and others, analysts say.
For example, if through its database, government can know exactly how many people are currently in the workforce, they can make plans to create more jobs and have a well thought out pension/retirement scheme for the population. With a database of the exact number of children in the country, the education sector can be planned and managed more appropriately.
“In the long run, this would reduce government spending, as plans will be made according to recorded data and there will be no wastage as a result of estimated guess work in investing and building infrastructure.
“The deployment of the National Identity Number (NIN) authentication and verification Service link to all Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA’s) and banks, was part of the commission’s strategy to ensure the proposed mandatory use of NIN,” said Chuks Onyepunuka, former general manager of the NIMC, Information Technology and Identity Database (IT/IDD).
According to Onyepunuka, “all government institutions and agencies which require the biometrics of individuals to offer functional services, or for security reasons are required by law to key into the NIMC National Identity Database for the purpose of identity management and verification.”
JUMOKE AKIYODE
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