You cannot plan for people you cannot count, Minister of Information and National Orientation Mohammed Idris told the leadership of the National Identity Management Commission during a visit to his office, framing a reliable national identity system as the foundation for effective governance, financial inclusion and the entire Renewed Hope Agenda.
Receiving NIMC Director General Abisoye Coker Odusote and her management team, who came to brief him on the newly enacted NIMC Act 2026, Idris argued that identity management sits at the centre of the president’s reform agenda precisely because reform requires knowing exactly who is being reformed for, their numbers, their demographics and what they represent. He said the federal government has intensified its push toward universal digital identity enrolment through a strengthened partnership between his ministry and NIMC, and stressed that achieving full coverage will require sustained public enlightenment and grassroots mobilisation, urging NIMC to deepen its collaboration with the National Orientation Agency, whose presence across all 774 local government areas offers a ready made platform for reaching every Nigerian.
Idris praised Coker Odusote’s leadership for transforming the commission over the past three years, noting that enrolling more than 136 million Nigerians and legal residents into the National Identity Database marks real progress, even as roughly 100 million Nigerians remain uncaptured. The 136 million already enrolled is very significant, he said, but every Nigerian deserves a place in the country’s national planning. He also credited the commission for maintaining a secure identity system without a single reported data breach, and pledged that all public communication platforms under his ministry, including the News Agency of Nigeria, would be deployed to support nationwide sensitisation on the benefits of digital identity.
National Orientation Agency Director General Lanre Issa Onilu reaffirmed his agency’s readiness to support NIMC’s enrolment drive through its grassroots network, telling the commission its teams are already present in the very communities NIMC needs to reach for public enlightenment and sensitisation. Responding, Coker Odusote said the NIMC Act 2026 has modernised the country’s identity framework by adding provisions on data protection, cybersecurity, digital public infrastructure and digital trust, positioning NIMC as Nigeria’s foundational digital identity authority, and disclosed that the president had personally directed the commission to begin a ward level enrolment exercise specifically so that people in rural and community level areas are not left out of any government intervention programme.
