President Muhammadu Buhari has disclosed plans to grow the country’s digital database to 70 million in 2019. He stated this at a conference organised by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), in collaboration with ID4Africa Movement.
The theme of the conference was: “Harmonisation of identity schemes and its response to current demand.”
Also, Buhari attributed the current wanton killings of farmers in the country to trans-human activities, adding that if the issue of harmonized identity was not taken seriously, the level of insecurity in the country might get worse with time. He described identity as an easy tool for governance.
Buhari, who was represented by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Mr. Boss Mustapha, lauded the organizers for their efforts to ensure that every African has an identity.
He said the event was coming at a time when the whole world was working towards globalizing digital identity, stressing that the measure would improve the level of insecurity on the continent and beyond.
According to him, the Federal Government had been able to raise it’s data base from 7 million in 2014 to 14 million, and 28 million in 2017, while the figure would rise to 50 million in 2019. He described identity as the nucleus of a people’s existence, and the safeguarding of lives.
Buhari further urged the organizers to make digital identity a global issue that must be addressed.
Chairman of the ID4Africa Movement, Dr. Joseph Azek commended Nigeria for her efforts to harmonize identity programmes. He said harmonized identity would guarantee free movement of people and goods across Africa.
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