National ID, key for economic growth, recovery plan – NIMC boss

The Director General/CEO of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), Engr. Aliyu Aziz, has said that the National Identification Number (NIN) is central for realizing the Economic Growth and Recovery Plan (EGRP) in order to effectively deliver important government services in Nigeria.

This was contained in a statement on Monday signed by its Corporate Communication Officer, Amaka Eze in Abuja.

Azia explained that NIMC, has a mandate to populate the National Identity Database (NIDB) with citizen’s data, as well as ensure that every registered person can be easily and quickly verified and their identities authenticated with the NIN.

“The Federal Government has planned to strengthen fiscal management, promote good governance and transparency required knowing and being able to identify citizens, which can only be achieved with the NIN” he said.

The DG stated this at the 2017 INDO – AFRICA ICT Expo, organized by the Telecom Equipment & Services Export Promotion Council (TEPC) in Lagos with the theme ‘Innovative Developments supporting Evolving Digital Economy’.

He continued, “The fragmented identity ecosystem in the country has remained a deterrent to the growth of basic amenities, which is required to realize a reasonable standard of living in the country.

This means that key economic challenges including improving security, rebuilding the economy and tackling corruption in the country have not been tackled because there is no comprehensive central database to guide the provision of these needs.

“Although Nigeria has the potential to be a major player in global economy, it has continued to struggle with development and the provision of very basic amenities such as education, healthcare, portable drinking water, food, and housing due to the lack of a central database to aid planning and policy making” he said.

Aziz further said that “NIN, is a very significant component of the National Identity Management System (NIMS). It is a non-intelligent eleven digit number, issued to individuals upon successful enrollment into the database.

“The NIN is a unique identifier, a requisite for the economic, social and political progress which can be verified and authenticated by institutions and persons in both the public and private sector, using the verification and authentication platforms already deployed by NIMC” he maintained.

The DG argued that institutions and organizations aiming to scale up the digital economy may not be able to offer innovative products and services to consumers without proper identification as all modern economic services globally are done digitally and rely on proper identification.