President Bola Tinubu has directed the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) to ensure that every Nigerian is enrolled in the country’s national identity database before the end of 2026, a move aimed at strengthening governance, improving service delivery, and creating a more reliable national identity system.
The directive, now widely referred to as the NIMC 2026 deadline, was disclosed by the Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of NIMC, Abisoye Coker-Odusote, during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics.
According to her, the commission has received a clear mandate from the President to complete the nationwide enrolment exercise before the year runs out.
“The President has given us till the end of this year to make sure that we capture every single Nigerian,” Coker-Odusote said.
She explained that the commission is expanding its reach through strategic partnerships under the World Bank-backed Identification for Development (ID4D) project to accelerate 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 stated.
Nationwide Enrolment Drive to Improve Planning
Coker-Odusote described the National Identification Number (NIN) as the foundation of Nigeria’s identity management framework, noting that every citizen is expected to have only one unique identity.
“That’s why it’s called a unique identifier, so that you’re only enrolled once,” she said.
She added that completing the nationwide registration exercise would also provide Nigeria with a more accurate population figure.
Current estimates of the country’s population vary significantly, with figures ranging from 200 million to 250 million people.
According to her, the enrolment process will provide the government with dependable demographic data for national planning and policy implementation.
“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.”
She stressed that reliable identity records are essential for effective governance.
“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.”
NIMC Explains How Duplicate Registrations Are Prevented
Responding to concerns about multiple registrations, the NIMC boss said technological improvements have significantly reduced the possibility of duplicate identities.
She explained that while the commission’s former enrolment system only detected duplicates after records had already entered the database, the upgraded biometric verification process identifies duplicate attempts much earlier.
“The legacy system had no way of verifying at the front end whether you had already been captured. Once the record comes into the system, it flags it as a duplicate or that the person already exists in the database.”
She added that only one valid identity is ultimately assigned to an individual.
“You would only have one identity generated for you. The other record goes into a deduplication bucket where it is invalidated.”
Coker-Odusote further explained that fingerprint and facial recognition technologies make it extremely difficult for anyone to obtain more than one National Identification Number.
“Absolutely. One of the things that this Act has done is to cement our role in capturing biometrics. Private and public sector organisations will no longer capture biometrics independently. They will validate identities through API integration with NIMC.”
She also highlighted the ongoing collaboration between NIMC and telecommunications companies.
“The telcos are already doing that with us. If you need a SIM card, they capture your facial biometrics, which are matched against our database in real time to confirm that you are who you claim to be. We’re using biometric validation to tighten security around identity confirmation.”
The enrolment campaign follows the signing of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) Act 2026 into law by President Tinubu on June 26, replacing the previous 2007 legislation.
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The new law strengthens Nigeria’s “One Person, One Identity” policy by establishing the National Identification Number as the country’s primary identity credential.
Under the updated legal framework, the NIN will continue to serve as a key requirement for accessing several government and essential private-sector services, including banking, passport processing, tax administration, pensions, land transactions, and consumer credit.
As the NIMC 2026 deadline draws closer, the commission says it will intensify community-based registration efforts nationwide to ensure that every eligible Nigerian is captured within the stipulated timeframe.
