NIN Linkage: Telcos task NIMC on capacity building

.Berate subscribers for responding late to verification calls

Telecommunication operators have beckoned on the management of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) to expand its capacity in handling backlogs of unverified national identity numbers (NINs) at its disposal.

The operators also berated some subscribers for always responding to national calls very late.

At a forum recently, the telcos, who said they don’t want to see subscribers in pain due to last-minute rush to do things, said Nigerians have a laissez-faire approach to doing things.

While lamenting that a subscriber that is barred amounts to revenue loss, they stressed the need to further simplify the NIN-SIM linkage process to ensure that even those barred can still be able to retrieve the line when all necessary corrections are made.

A Smile Communications official, Atinuke Ibrahim, said while subscribers are angry because they were barred, operators too are not finding it convenient because it amounts to a loss of revenue.

Urging NIMC to increase its capacity and accelerate the verification process at its end, she called for extended time for operators to be able to complete the process.

From MTN, Winifred Udeh, also urged the identity commission to expedite the verification process time, stressing that at the beginning of the exercise, the telecommunications firm had donated equipment worth N1.2 billion to NIMC after it discovered huge capacity gaps and a lack of funding.

While assuring telcos support for NIMC and the entire process, Airtel’s Ifeloju Alakija, said the whole essence is to have a correct identification database of all Nigerians and foreigners in the country, stressing that it is harmonisation journey.

“As such NIMC’s NIN details of an individual become the single source of truth for correct identification so that when you do your verification against NIMC to buy your SIM cards, or others, including immigration, driver’s license, among others, the data is now based on what NIMC holds and not what you tell us or agency of government. So, to that extent, across MNOs, we can know that Ade Adekunle is Ade Adekunle, today, tomorrow or whenever and if I need to change my identity, I need to go to NIMC first, change my identity, then, it is replicated across all database. The reason it is called the harmonisation journey, meaning that the information is the same across all agencies that require it,” he stated.

According to him, MNOs have donated millions worth of equipment to NIMC to ensure that capacity enhancement would happen, and verification of subscribers would happen seamlessly, even online as much as possible.

Globacom’s Bayo Majekodunmi, said the urgency to complete the process was missing on the part of Nigerians, who would prefer to wait until the last minute before rushing to complete a process.

“We don’t want people to suffer but to ensure a proper Nigeria the process must not be allowed to fail. MNOs will do their part, we urged other members of the ecosystem, especially NIMC to also play their part adequately well,” he stated.

On his part, the President, of the National Association of Telecoms Subscribers of Nigeria (NATCOMS) Chief Deolu Ogunbanjo, also stressed the need for the telecoms regulator to extend the deadline date, saying so many subscribers have submitted their NINs, which have not been verified by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC).

According to Ogunbanjo, the Operator’s Consumer Centre stands as the primary location for consumers to complete their registration fully, with data provided there being verifiable.

However, the NATCOMS president noted that telecom agents were bypassing crucial information during the registration process, resulting in incomplete registrations of subscribers.

“For example, during interactions with telecoms representatives, some agents fail to collect all required information from subscribers.

“If a subscriber cannot provide certain details, agents often leave the registration incomplete. Consequently, these incomplete registrations are deemed unverifiable,” he said.

Further, Ogunbanjo noted that NIMC also shares responsibility in this process. He said the challenges often arise when telecom companies attempt to upload collected data on NIMC’s server, owing to network issues.