Tinubu Orders NIMC To Register All Nigerians By End Of 2026

• President Bola Tinubu has directed NIMC to enrol every Nigerian into the national identity database before the end of 2026.
• NIMC says the exercise will support national planning, governance and accurate population data.
• The commission says its upgraded biometric verification system will eliminate duplicate identities and strengthen security.

President Bola Tinubu has directed the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) to ensure that every Nigerian is enrolled in the National Identity Number (NIN) database before the end of 2026.

The Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of NIMC, Abisoye Coker-Odusote, disclosed this during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, saying the directive is aimed at building a comprehensive national identity system to improve governance, planning and service delivery.

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According to her, the commission is partnering with organisations under the World Bank-supported Identification for Development (ID4D) project to accelerate nationwide enrolment.

“The President has given us till the end of this year to make sure that we capture every single Nigerian,” Coker-Odusote said.

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She explained that the National Identification Number serves as a unique identifier for every citizen and would enable the government to determine Nigeria’s actual population.

“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.”

The NIMC boss said a reliable national identity database is essential for effective governance and policy implementation.

“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.”

Responding to concerns about multiple registrations, Coker-Odusote said the commission’s upgraded biometric verification system has significantly reduced the possibility of duplicate identities.

She explained that while the previous system detected duplicate enrolments only after records had been uploaded, the new system verifies individuals at the point of enrolment using fingerprint and facial recognition technology.

“You would only have one identity generated for you. The other record goes into a deduplication bucket where it is invalidated.”

She added that both public and private organisations would now verify identities through NIMC’s application programming interface (API), rather than independently capturing biometric data.

According to her, telecommunications companies are already using the platform to validate customers’ identities in real time during SIM registration and replacement processes, a move she said has strengthened identity verification and enhanced security.