‘Why Kidnappers, Terrorists Can’t Always Be Tracked Through NIN’ – NIMC DG Explains

• NIMC Director-General Abisoye Coker-Odusote has explained why terrorists and kidnappers cannot always be traced through the NIN system.

The Director-General of the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), Abisoye Coker-Odusote, has explained why terrorists and kidnappers are not always traceable through Nigeria’s National Identification Number (NIN) system despite its critical role in the country’s security architecture.

Speaking during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, Coker-Odusote said kidnappers often evade detection by using the mobile phones of their victims instead of their own registered lines.

According to her:

“We already know the NIN is the foundational identity for the security architecture, but a lot of the time, you find out the kidnappers use the phones of the people they have abducted, which means how do you trace them because they are not using their own phones?”

She also suggested that some kidnappers may not even be registered in Nigeria’s identity database.

“There is a theory that it may be possible that these kidnappers are not Nigerians and are brought into the country 48 or 72 hours before a kidnapping takes place, specifically for that purpose. I’m not insinuating anything, but if that were the case, they naturally would not be captured in our database. Those are some of the scenarios we have.”

Coker-Odusote stressed that while the NIN remains the foundation of Nigeria’s digital identity and security framework, criminals frequently adopt tactics that make them difficult to trace, including using SIM cards and mobile phones belonging to their victims.

The National Identification Number (NIN) is an 11-digit unique identity number issued by the National Identity Management Commission to Nigerians and legal residents under the NIMC Act of 2007.

The Federal Government has made the NIN a key part of its security strategy through the mandatory linkage of SIM cards to the identity number, a policy designed to strengthen identity verification, improve criminal investigations and combat crime.

Beyond security, the NIN is also required for services including passport applications, bank account opening, driver’s licence processing and access to several government programmes.

However, NIMC has consistently maintained that the NIN is an identity management system—not a surveillance tool—and that successfully tracking criminals depends on collaboration between security agencies, telecom operators and other relevant institutions.