Of the 12 million registered vehicles in Nigeria, only 2.53 million are captured in the Nigerian Insurance Industry Database (NIID) as at Monday, 30 September 2019, according to the Nigerian Insurers Association (NIA). This means that a whopping 9.47 million are either without insurance cover or have fake insurance.
The huge gap, said the NIA, is mind-boggling and not only robs the industry of its expected revenue but puts many Nigerian publics on risks of accident, death or other losses without compensation.
NIA said it would go all out to let Nigerians realise that the insurance policy in their hands is a valuable asset that should be cherished, which implies that they get their cover from the right sources.
“We are telling Nigerians that insurance is something valuable if you have genuine one because it gives you relief and peace of mind,” Yetunde Ilori, director-general, NIA, said at the launch of a new campaign ‘Wetin U Carry’ beginning today.
Ilori said the association would from October 2, 2019 (today) deploy a team of 33 persons, known as Insurance Squad, who would be kitted to move around all parts of Lagos State to educate the public on the benefits of possessing genuine motor insurance covers.
She stated that the association desires to put the slogan, ‘Wetin U Carry’, on the lips of everybody. She said the slogan is not meant to punish motorists for not having insurance, but to enable them check by themselves whether what they have as insurance is genuine or not.
Ilori maintained that the campaign is not geared towards enforcement, but to let people understand that they can have genuine policies that could give them rest of mind in times of incidence.
She said the campaign would be driven through different platforms, such as billboard advertorials, media and digital and that the pilot scheme would commence from Lagos and later extended to other states.
“We are going to be seen on the road from October 2, and we are deploying personnel we call Insurance Squad. We have engaged 33 people of them,” she said.
“The plan is to cover the entire Lagos State, over a period of one month. They would be kitted and interact on a friendly manner with motorists, telling tell the nature of their insurance whether it is genuine or about to expire. Details of the policies would be derived from the USSD code *556*11#,” she said.
Whilst the campaign runs, Ilori said, the association would also launch a unified platform that would enable people buy insurance with ease.
“The platform would have an application that would showcase all the insurance companies and this would enable people buy make their choice of which insurance company that want to buy from, and that will help weed off fake. The platform would also provide opportunities for people to lodge their complaints, and report claims,” she said.
It is compulsory under the law that any vehicle plying Nigerian roads must have a minimum third party insurance cover. This guarantees the motorist or vehicle owner protection against thirty party damage, loss or death in the event of an accident.
Motor Third Party cover is sold for N5,000 for cars and N7,000 for commercial vehicles and has a liability cover of up to N1 million for third party damages (property), and no limit to life in the event of death of third party.
