70% National ID Cards Are Fake – DG

Director-General and Chief Executive, National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), Barrister Chris E. Onyemenam, has said that about 70 per cent of the national identity cards currently in circulation are fake.

Onyemenam, who made this assertion at a forum organised by NIMC added that more than 100 million Nigerians especially in the rural areas have been living without national identity cards.

The NIMC DG said the concentration of populations and activities in the urban areas has compelled rural dwellers to suffer serious neglect during national identity card registration processes.

Onyemenam said national identity card enrolment units of NIMC are to be established in each of the 774 local government headquarters in the country before the third quarter of this year.

Onyemenam stated that previous efforts at registering Nigerians focused on the issuance of identity cards, NIMC this time around would introduced novel parameters to ensure that the process meets international standards.

He said NIMC is poised to create awareness on the importance of registration, saying national identity cards in the future would become the basis for all government transactions in the country.

Also speaking, chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Interior, Umar Bature, who spoke through a member of the committee, said the identity card scheme would help in crime prevention and control.

He stated that the registration would provide reliable database for national planning as well as ease the process of infrastructural management in the country while facilitating the provision of other social services.