Nigeria Content Online

A new national
identity registration would begin after the elections, the National
Identity Management Commission, said on Wednesday, after the initial
efforts by the federal government years ago could not yield the desired
results.

Chris Onyemenam,
the Director General, National Identity Management Commission, the
guest speaker at the April edition of Information Value Chain Breakfast
Forum, stated this at a monthly breakfast forum organised by Digital
Jewels Limited. He said registration had already begun in Lagos and
Abuja.

In his
presentation, titled ‘The National Identity Management Scheme:
e-Commerce catalyst or encumbrance’, Mr Onyemenam spoke on the gravity
of challenges in identity management in Nigeria, and how the commission
plans to tackle the encumbrances and restore sanity in the nation’s
identity sector.

The botched project

Over eight years
ago, the contract for the implementation of the national identity card
scheme was awarded to SAGEM of France. However, the contract, which was
laden with alleged bribery scandals, did not yield the results
Nigerians expected because years after the registration, majority of
Nigerians neither had a national card nor numbers with which to be
identified.

In May 2007, the
NIMC Act established the commission and provided the legal framework
for the reforms in the sector. The reform mandate includes collecting
basic demographic and biometric data, creating, operating and managing
a National Identity Database, providing an on-line/off line cost
effective verification and authentication infrastructure in Nigeria,
integrating with ID schemes, providing standardized identity attributes
and fostering the orderly development of an identity sector in Nigeria.

“As e-commerce
catalyst, identity management has several benefits to the economy,”
said Mr Onyemenam. “These include streamlining biometric-linked
projects in the public and privates sector, eliminating multiple and
ghost identities, reducing identity theft and related fraud (advance
fee fraud), enhancing the work of law enforcement agencies, financial
inclusion and development of financial services sector, creating new
economic and employment opportunities, among others.”

The challenges

The challenges
facing the scheme include multiple identification initiatives by
institutions such as the Pension Commission, land registers, Federal
Inland Revenue service, SIM registrars, Law enforcement Agencies,
Financial Institutions, the Independent National Electoral Commission,
Immigrations, Federal Road Safety Corps and several others who have to
embark on their own personal registration and the absence of ‘core’
identity sector infrastructure.

Mr Onyemenam said that identity management is party of the federal
government desire to develop and deepen the consumer credit sector,
facilitate the enforcement of existing/extant laws and meet global
practices, facilitate financial inclusion and development of commerce
generally, harmonization of identification schemes committee in 2005.
“It would help in the enhancement of the consumer credit sector,
governance through e-governance, revenue processes, administration of
social welfare programmes and subsidies, national payment system and
improve standard of life as it would enhance national security among
others,” he said.