The Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, explained that a proper database of the number of citizens in the country would help for proper budgeting, which is why the National Identity Number (NIN) remains important.
He said this at a forum organised by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) held in Abuja on Sunday.
Pantami said that NIN would help to properly identify the citizens of Nigeria as is obtained in developed nations like the United States through its National Insurance Security Number.
He said that Nigeria with its population – 7the most populous in the world – battled with identifying the total number of people living in the country, and for this reason NIN was important.
The minister said, “It is the number that one is identified either as a citizen or as a legal resident. Any person resident in Nigeria is entitled to it by law.
“It is the foundational identity and no responsible country will exist without providing foundational ID to its citizens and legal residents.
“It exists in the UK as National Insurance Number, in the U. S. as the National Insurance Security Number, even in India with population of about 1.2 billion it exists for all citizens.
“Every country has a type of identification but in Nigeria, the 7th most populous nation after China, India, U.S., Indonesia, Pakistan and Brazil, we are still struggling to know the total number of people living in Nigeria.
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“How can you get your national budget right; how can we get our education, health, security and social intervention right without knowing the population of Nigerian residents.
“With national identification such abuse is not possible.
“With biometrics, which are on record, the nation does not require frequent census if the database is updated.
“The same data base can be with the National Population Commission because it is part and parcel of National Identity Management Commission.”
On the role of NIN and security, Pantami said that the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) partnered with security agencies to provide information that would aid their effort in combating insecurity.
He said, “We are not security agencies, what we are doing is our little effort to support security agencies.
“NCC only provides information for security agencies, if security agencies do not contact it we will not know.”
