Chris Onyemenam, director general , National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) has called on Nigerians to make use of the Internet to fast-track the enrolment process in the National Identification Number (NIN) project saying that the agency’s online portal is capable of accommodating 40 million users.
Onyemenam said that the pre-enrolment portal is a simplified version of the enrolment form and was created by the agency for citizens in Nigeria and the Diaspora to complete their demographic enrolment before going to an enrolment centre for biometric capture.
He stressed that the demographic aspects of enrolment are better conducted online.
He urged Nigerians to make use of the portal in order to avoid crowding at the enrolment centres as it has the advantages of saving time and ensuring that enrolment centres are not crowded.
The NIMC boss explained that the resolution of the finger print takes time and that those who make use of the Internet portal spend less time than when they come into enrolment centres for their demographics.
According to him, what people need to come to the enrolment centre for is their biometrics data capture as Internet penetration in Nigeria is at a level where it is possible for millions to log on and pre-enrol.
“We created a user friendly interface through the Internet for citizens to conclude their demographic enrolment,” the director general said.
“By that, they supply information like their names, surnames, sex, gender, dates of birth and details of next of kin, occupational status and so on and so forth.
“Our pre-enrolment process has been designed with a simple fact in mind,” Barrister Onyemenam said. “Let’s say 40 million people over an eight hour period – highly improbable. But that is a worst case scenario. Then let’s assume that, in a best case scenario, that there isn’t a significant pressure. About one million people across the globe who are Nigerians or non-Nigerians can create their user account.”
He said that the simple process and is in three parts. “May be, after the first page, you may just go off your Internet. When you come again, you use your user account to call up the same form and you continue where you stopped.”
He said that, when the pilot scheme started, the agency had ten systems in each state office and was able to cover the entire country. NIMC is operating in the 34 states of the federation and Abuja. Because of security issues, Bornu and Yobe state offices of the agency are not open.
After it had acquired 1650 units, enrolment moved up to 50,000 a week. With an additional 500 units coming from the banks, enrolment figures will still be going higher.
“Our capacity to enrol is currently 20,000 a day,” the NIMC boss said. He added that his agency plans to deploy three and half times that capacity in the hope of keeping pace with enrolment.
“But you know that is installed capacity,” he said. “All you need to do is to ensure that people do their work. There is fuel or diesel to guarantee power supply.
“There is awareness campaign to make sure that people use the online portal for capturing data. We will cross check and confirm before the system can accept it.”