Applicants lament: We leave home early, abandon work to get identification numbers without success
From afar, his long puzzled face was conspicuous. At noon on Friday, Boniface Ani and his wife, Doris, had spent over six hours at the Alausa centre of the National Identity Management Commission in Lagos, waiting for a miracle to happen in an attempt to get their National Identity Numbers.
The couple had grown weary of a crowd milling around the entrance gate of the commission sharing premises with the Lagos headquarters of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps.
After writing their names on a list provided by the NIMC officials, they were told to return in February for capturing as there was a backlog of previous applications on the rack.
Ani, who runs an accounting firm in the Ikeja area of the state, was torn in-between frustration and anxiety, unsure of getting his NIN linked with his SIMs (Subscriber Identification Modules) before the February 9 deadline.
“It is obvious I cannot get it before the deadline,” Ani declared, disappointedly.
The Federal Government had declared on December 15, 2020, that all SIMs not registered with valid NINs on the network of the telecommunications companies would be blocked after December 30, 2020.
It later extended the deadline for subscribers without NIN to February 9, 2021 following criticisms that greeted large gatherings across NIMC centres amid a spike in COVID-19 infections and growing death rates. The three weeks’ extension for subscribers with NINs will elapse on Tuesday, January 19.
As of October, the total number of mobile network connections was 207.58 million while only 43 million Nigerians have NINs, thus leaving 164 million telephone users at the risk of being deactivated.
As the extended deadline draws near, crowds keep surging at NIMC centres to beat the deadline, paying little or no attention to wearing of facemasks, physical distancing and other COVID-19 safety protocols.
Rowdiness at the centres continues to mount on a daily basis as further extension has yet to be announced. The Nigerian Communications Commission on Wednesday said it was awaiting the advice of the Federal Government regarding the deadline.
The Director, Public Affairs, NCC, Ikechukwu Adinde, noted that the earlier announced deadlines were still in force despite the clamour for extension or outright suspension of the registration process.
If the deadline stayed, Ani and his wife, a businesswoman, feared their means of livelihood were on the line.
“I have not gone to work today (Friday), neither has my wife. Most of us, our livelihoods depend on our phone numbers and we don’t want to be cut off,” he stated in a tone laden with worries.
The 48-year-old accountant told Sunday PUNCH that he and his wife met many people when they got to the NIMC office in Alausa at 6.30am and were asked to write their names on a list.
He said, “The officials told us to come back on February 4. I was shocked because that would be few days to the deadline. I waited till afternoon, thinking that I would see someone who can help me. The crowd keeps increasing and I don’t want to join them because of COVID-19 pandemic. That was why I distanced myself.
“The crowd was more than this when I came last week. It will require more than one year for everyone to get their NINs, and in light of COVID-19, it is not advisable to stampede people into getting it done. If the government is saying the new strain of COVID-19 spreads faster, it can only get worse in this kind of situation.”
The exercise has been more hectic for his wife, Doris, who had visited the centre thrice without any hope of getting captured soon.
Her first visit was in December when the sight of “an extremely large crowd” turned her off. She revisited the centre and Tuesday as early as 4am, thinking she would strike it lucky.
She explained, “I still met a crowd and we wrote our names. I returned home and came back around 8am. I could not find the list again. People I met told me that the officials were attending to those who wrote their names two weeks ago. They later told us to wait till February.
“I have gone to another location on Mobolaji Bank Anthony Way (Lagos), but I discovered that the centre is no longer there. The deadline is fast approaching and I can’t function without my phone. I came today (Friday) again to try my luck. The exercise is just frustrating. I have wasted today again now.
“At this time when COVID-19 is raging, the registration should be a continuous process. You don’t give a short period for Nigeria to register. The government should also open many centres in different areas so that the registration will be fast. An official there told me they only attend to 200 people every day. A friend of mine came here four days consecutively without going to work. She got tired and stopped coming.” Punch
