Nigeria has generated a total of 57.3 million unique National Identity Number (NIN) since it began the process of citizens and residents registration by linking existing SIM cards to NIN in December, 2020.
On December 15, 2020,
the federal government through the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Ali Ibrahim (Pantami) and the director-general National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) Aliyu Aziz had issued a directive to telecom operators to disconnect all mobile telephone lines not linked to valid National Identification Numbers (NINs) by December 30, 2020.
This deadline however have been extended a number of times.
The federal government has now approve the extension of the deadline for NIN-SIM data verification to the 26th of July, 2021. A statement from NIMC has said.
“There are now a total of 57.3 million unique NIN enrolments, with average of 3 to 4 SIMs per NIN. With the great number of enrolment centres across the country, every citizen and legal resident should be able to obtain their NINs.”
“As at June 28, 2021, a total of 5,410 enrolment systems are now available across the country and this would significantly ease the NIN enrolment process and subsequent linkage of NIN to SIM.
It is worthy of note that there were only about 800 such enrolment systems as at December 2020.
Minister of Communications and Digital Economy Dr Isa Ali Ibrahim (Pantami) on behalf of the federal government, appreciates Nigerians for their patience and compliance with the federal government’s directive on the NIN-SIM registration exercise.
Executive Vice Chairman Nigerian Communications Commission Prof Umar Garba Dambatta and the Director-General, National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) Engr Aliyu Aziz urge citizens and legal residents to make sure they use the opportunity to complete the process of enrolment and verification.”