The Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof Isa Pantami, has decried the insignificant use of the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) by the nation’s security architecture to tackle the security challenges in Nigeria.
“We have created ICT platforms for security agencies to leverage on to reduce crimes and criminality to the barest minimum. Iit is left for them to do the needful.
“It is like making or cooking food for somebody. You cannot force the person to eat. So we are appealing to them to please eat,” Pantami said.
Pantami noted that agencies under his ministry such as the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) and the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) have adequate ICT platforms to track crimes and criminality in the country and bring those culpable to book.
The minister made the remarks at the International Conference Centre, Abuja during the Fourth National Identity Day Celebration organised by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC).
The theme of this year’s celebration was: “Traditional Institutions as Critical Stakeholders for Citizens Mobilisation.”
He said when the issue of compulsory linkage of National Identity Numbers (NIN) with Subscribers Identity Module (SIM) became a policy, he was singled out for blackmail and all forms of attacks designed to frustrate government efforts, but “today, the policy has come to stay and the criminal enemies have been defeated.”
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Pantami said the linkage of NIN with SIM has recorded nearly 90 million enrolment across the country; a milestone he described as unprecedented since the creation of NIMC in 2007.
The Minister said there was no way Nigeria could make significant developments in health, agriculture, education, security and prosperity in all sectors of the economy without legal National Identity numbers for its citizens, insisting it is the foundation of developments anywhere in the world.
He described the theme of the 2022 commemoration of the National Identity Day as apt, saying the exercise is now being taken to the rural areas to capture millions of citizens in the hinterlands.
Pantami who commended President Muhammadu Buhari for giving him all the support needed to drive the Ministry and its policies, said within the past three years, more than 19 policies are being initiated and implemented by his ministry alone.
He said the commemoration of the National Identity Day was necessary in line with the objectives of Sustainable Development Goals programme of the United Nations and the need to capture the identity of all citizens in NIMC database by 2030.
Speaking further on the theme Pantami said: “Our traditional rulers and other traditional institutions in our country have key and critical roles to play in mediating, stimulating, mobilising and rallying our people in the rural, semi-urban and even urban areas, to embrace enrolment to obtain their NIN.
“While traditional rulers and our monarchs are the custodians of the traditional institutions in the homelands, all of us who are in the cities are from one rural area, one community or the other; and, our respect for our traditional rulers remains unshakeable.
“This is why we chose the theme of this year’s commemoration, which is: “Traditional Institutions as Critical Stakeholders for Citizens’ Mobilisation,” and this underlines the importance of our traditional institutions as great pillars for nation-building.
“I therefore, call on our institutions to rise to the occasion so that together with them, we can encourage our citizens to embrace enrolment to ensure that the remaining population that has not enrolled is fully covered, and we can achieve 100 per cent enrolment in the next 24 months.”