The Federal Government has extended the deadline for Nigerians to link their National Identity Number (NIN) to their SIM cards to July 26.
This was disclosed in a joint press statement by the Director, Public Affairs of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Ikechukwu Adinde; and the Head, Corporate Communications, Nigeria Identity Management Commission (NIMC), Kayode Adegoke.
According to the statement, the extension was due to the pleas from stakeholders in the telecom industry.
“The decision to extend the deadline was made after a request by stakeholders on the need to consolidate the enrolment and NIN-SIM verification process following the rapid increase in the number of enrolment systems across the country.”
The statement further reveals that there are 5,410 enrolment systems that are now available across the country compared to only 800 in 2020.
“As at June 28, 2021, a total of 5,410 enrolment systems are now available across the country and this would significantly ease the NIN enrolment process and subsequent linkage of NIN to SIM.
“It is worthy of note that there were only about 800 such enrolment systems as at December 2020.”
This has undeniably helped to ramp up registration to 57.3 million unique NIN enrolments, with average of 3 to 4 SIMs per NIN.
The FG has extended the NIN-SIM linkage several times. Before this latest extension, it was supposed to end June 30th. Other dates included December 30, 2020; January 19, 2021; February 9, 2021, April 6, 2021 and May 6, 2021.
