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The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) will, from first quarter of 2021, require possession of National Identity Number (NIN) for vehicles registration and drivers licence.
The NIN is already a requirement for opening of bank accounts and application for international passport.
The NIN is a set of unique numbers issued by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) to citizens who have registered with it. The NIMC captures the digital identity of all citizens and issued them the NIN as their unique digital identity.
The NIN is designed for citizens’ registration as part of government’s national strategy to build database on all citizens for enhanced economic planning. It consists of 11 non- intelligible numbers randomly chosen and assigned to an individual at the completion of enrolment into the National Identity Database (NIDB).
The provisions of the NIMC Act 23, 2007, include the enforcement of the mandatory use of the NIN and the application of appropriate sanctions and penalties on defaulters as provided under Section 28 of the NIMC Act.
There are also five gazetted regulations since 2017 through which President Muhammadu Buhari has sought to apply the full mandate of the NIMC Act.
The gazetted regulations are: ‘Mandatory Use of the National Identification Number (NIN) Regulations, 2017’; ‘Nigeria Biometrics Standard Regulations, 2017’; ‘Registration of Persons and Contents of the National Identity Database Regulations, 2017’. “Access to Register Information in the National Identity Database Regulations, 2017 and Licensing of the Frontend Services of the National Identity Management Commission Regulations, 2017.
According to Corps Marshal, Mr. Boboye Oyeyemi, the mandatory use of NIN by the FRSC, apart from complying to extant laws, will also help to enhance road safety.
Oyeyemi, while speaking to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) at the weekend said: “I must commend the government. With the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), now we have one national data base, one identity. You cannot use double identity now and with the biometrics you cannot be funny.
“You know before some people have about five different identities but now you are forced to pick one. Once you pick one with NIMC that is what you will be using because it is now going to be as from next month (December). It is going to be compulsory.
“Now if you want to renew your driver’s licence or you want to obtain a fresh driver licence, you must provide your NIN. NIN is the first thing and with that no biometrics will be done again they will import it from NIMC.
“So I am talking about using technology now to enhance security so with this I think we make progress we are really on course.”
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