IRIN Focus on national registration programme

Over a four-week period that began on 18 February, every Nigerian aged 18 years and above is required to register for a national identity card. According to officials of the Department of National Civic Registration, which is in charge of the programme, at least 60 million Nigerians are estimated to be eligible for registration. The main objective of issuing identity cards to Nigerians, according to the government, is to create a national database of information, that will aid effective government. That information will include fingerprints, blood groups and other personal details which a string of censuses since independence in 1960 have been unable to provide. Expected benefits span various areas President Olusegun Obasanjo was more specific about the expected benefits when he kicked off the exercise by becoming the first person to be registered. "Firstly, it serves as a medium of identification of Nigerian citizens, and as an effective control of illegal immigrants," he said. "It also avails the government with comprehensive and reliable date for planning purposes." There are also other expected benefits in terms of checking fraud in financial - particularly banking - transactions, and facilitating criminal investigations, he said. First proposed by Obasanjo when he was a military ruler in the 1970s, the national identity card project had been on the drawing board for the past 25 years. After Obasanjo handed over power in 1979 to elected president Shehu Shagari, his successor decided the project was not a priority. When eventually it was taken up by a succession of military rulers after Shagari was toppled in 1983, it never got off the ground despite the expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars. "So-called contractors simply collected money for the job but never did it," a senior official of the National Planning Commission told IRIN. Besides, the project also became afflicted by Nigeria's north-south, Muslim-Christian divide. In the north it was perceived as something that would offend religious sensibilities by compelling women placed in purdah (religious confinement) to come out in the open and mingle with men. For this reason it was stoutly opposed by religious and political leaders in the predominantly Muslim region. Population figures seen as less than reliable In the south it was widely believed that population figures in the north had been grossly inflated in previous censuses, mainly because enumerators were not allowed to see women in purdah and had to accept figures given them. To buttress this belief, people would often point out that Nigeria was the only country in West Africa where figures indicated a heavy population density in the Sahel, the arid region just below the Sahara. In other nations, population density was much lower in the Sahelian belt. The mutual suspicion between the two regions over the identity card project appeared to deepen when the government suggested last year that obtaining the new cards would be a prerequisite for voters in general elections due this year. This move was bitterly criticised by some political leaders in the north. The Arewa Consultative Forum, which purports to represent the interests of the people of northern Nigeria, threatened to boycott voter registration if it was tied to the national identity card programme. The reason given for the objection was that most people in the region were illiterate and would not be able to cope with the intricacies involved in registering for identity cards. The government eventually compromised and decided to separate the identity card project from voter registration. To further calm religious feelings, it was decided that only women would be allowed to register women in religious confinement. Illegal immigration a major concern With the project now underway, it remains to be seen how effective it will prove in controlling illegal immigration into Nigeria. This has been a major concern of the Nigerian authorities since the country's oil riches attracted the first flood of immigrants from other West African nations in the 1970s. After the boom was followed by sharply reduced income due to plunging oil prices in the early 1980s immigrants became the first targets of the then civilian government, which blamed them for taking jobs that should have gone to Nigerians and for an increase in crime. When undocumented immigrants were ordered out of Nigeria in 1983, the dramatic departure of millions of people, perhaps the biggest exodus in post-colonial Africa, proved a massive embarrassment to the Nigerian authorities. Since then different governments have thought of an alternative, continuous and less dramatic method of dealing with the problems of illegal immigration. Senior Nigerian immigration officials believe the national identity cards will prove an effective solution. But some analysts think differently. "Many so-called illegal immigrants have stayed long enough in Nigeria that they can easily pass for citizens," Nkemjika Nwofor, a sociology lecturer, told IRIN. "Besides, many of the ethnic groups that straddle the country's border areas have sizable populations on both sides with their nationalities hardly distinguishable." Many communities straddle borders There are millions of Hausas and Fulanis in both Niger Republic and northern Nigeria. The Yorubas of southwestern Nigeria are also present in significant numbers in the Republic of Benin, while most of the ethnic minorities that live along the 1,500-kilometre border with Cameroon have relatives on the other side. "What I'm sure the national identity card registration will do is to tell the number of adults in Nigeria, something our censuses haven't been able to do," Nwofor said. "Telling with accuracy who is a Nigerian or not is a different matter altogether."