Fidelia Soriwei, Abuja
President Bola Tinubu has directed the National Identity Management Commission to ensure that every Nigerian is enrolled in the national identity database by the end of 2026 as part of efforts to strengthen governance, planning and service delivery across the country.
The Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of NIMC, Abisoye Coker-Odusote, disclosed this during an appearance on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, saying the commission had been mandated to reach communities nationwide and register all citizens.
“The President has given us till the end of this year to make sure that we capture every single Nigerian,” she said.
Coker-Odusote explained that NIMC is working with enrolment partners through the World Bank-supported Identification for Development project to expand registration across the country.
“What we have done is we have partnered through the World Bank ID4D project with front-end partners. They are part of the digital identity ecosystem. These are private citizens that we’ve enabled and given jobs to enrol citizens on our behalf,” she said.
She noted that the National Identification Number serves as a unique identifier designed to ensure that individuals are registered only once.
“That’s why it’s called a unique identifier, so that you’re only enrolled once,” she added.
According to her, the nationwide exercise will also help establish Nigeria’s actual population figure, amid varying estimates of between 200 million and 250 million people.
“It is estimated that we’re 200 million. When we’re done enrolling, we will then know the actual numbers that we have. Some estimates say 230 million, while a few people say 250 million.
“Your identity is basically the foundation for effective governance and service delivery. How can you plan if you don’t know the total number of persons that you have?
“We have been mandated by Mr President to go down to the community levels to enrol every single Nigerian,” she said.
Addressing concerns about multiple registrations, Coker-Odusote said NIMC’s biometric verification system prevents individuals from obtaining more than one identity, with duplicate records automatically detected and invalidated.
She added that fingerprint and facial recognition technologies now support real-time identity validation, while telecommunications companies already use the system to verify subscribers.
The development follows President Tinubu’s signing of the NIMC Act 2026 on June 26, replacing the 2007 law and reinforcing the “One Person, One Identity” policy.
“The legislation establishes the National Identification Number as the primary identity credential for accessing key government and private sector services, including banking, passport applications, taxation, pensions, land transactions and consumer credit.”
She added
