Sequel to the partial restriction placed on subscribers that had not linked their subscriber identity numbers (SIMs) with their National Identity Numbers (NIN) by the Federal Government in April 4, this year, the number of enrollees into the National Identity Data Base (NIDB) of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) has continued to grow by leaps and bounds.
According to NIMC, NIDB has recorded what it said is “over 85.59 million unique records” with the highest cumulative enrollment figure of over 9.7 million recorded in Lagos State while regional figures indicated an almost equal distribution across the North and South.
According to the gender distribution of enrollees, male recorded 48.066, 271 representing 56 per cent of total enrolment while female accounted for 44 per cent with 37,252,127 enrolments.
In terms of geopolitical response to the NIN registration, the Northwest had the highest with 22, 496,685, representing 26 per cent of the total figure while the Southwest geopolitical was next with 21 247,741 representing 25 per cent of total figures. Northcentral is next with 14,299,388 representing 17 per cent. Northeast and Southeast had 12 per cent apiece with 10, 637, 583 and 9,838,737. The least is Southeast with 7,071,265 representing eight per cent of total enrolments.
Giving further breakdown of the enrolment figures, the top 10 states, aside Lagos include Kano, Kaduna, Ogun, Oyo and six others.
Of the 9,737,963 total enrolments in Lagos, 4,411,633 were female while 5,326,330 stood for male enrollees. Kano recorded a total of 7,320,213 with 3,111,085 and 4,209,128 enrolments for female and male. Kaduna had 5,089,306 as total number while 2,257,487 represented female and 2,831,819 male enrollees.
Ogun recorded 3,575,870 with 1,710,829 and 1,865,041 for female and male. Oyo had 3,476,558 with 1,662,021 female and 1,814,537 male. It was followed by FCT Abuja with 3,089,710 total and gender distribution of 1,302,205 and 1,787,505 for female and male. Katsina Hard 2,871,438 as total while 1,169,778 and 1,701,660 female and male.
Rivers State had 2,601,167 total enrolments while 1,151,534 stood for female registrants and 1,449,633 male registrants. Delta had 2,310,988 as total while 1,083,058 stood for female and 1,227,930 for male. Last on the list of 10 is Niger State with 2,239,149 total enrolment and 862,106 female and 1,377,043 male enrollees.
As at the time of wielding the big stick in April, NIMC said it had issued over 78 million unique NINs till date, while the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) had also said over 125 million SIMs have had their NINs submitted for immediate linkage, verification and authentication.
The March deadline marked the eight time after the first deadline of between December 16 and 30, 2020 was extended to January 19, 2021.