As Nigerians continue to panic over the January 19th deadline for NIN-SIM linkage, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has disclosed that it has collected only 47.8 million NINs so far.
The commission in a statement on Tuesday thanked the general public for adhering to the exercise and urged citizens to link their SIM before February 9th.
The Minister of Communications, Dr Isa Pantami, had announced January 19th as the deadline for mobile subscribers to link their NINs to their SIMs. He also gave February 9th as the deadline for subscribers who don’t have NINs at all.
In the statement, NCC said: “At the end of a review meeting on 18th January 2021, the Technical Implementation Committee under the Ministerial Task Force has reported significant progress in the ongoing NIN-SIM linkage exercise.
“So far a total of 47.8 million NINs have been collected by the mobile operators. At an average of 3 to 4 SIMs per subscriber, this means many millions will be linked up before the deadline in February 2021.
Reacting to the report, the Minister expressed satisfaction with this commendable achievement.
“He expressed the Federal Government’s appreciation for the commitment demonstrated by all stakeholders and citizens and urged them to submit their NINs before 9th February, 2021 deadline
The Minister urged the technical team to fast-track the processes so that the project is delivered soonest.
“The Technical Committee drew attention to the App developed by FGN which allows subscribers to link up to a maximum of seven (7) SIMs to their NIN.
“The Minister concluded by reminding Nigerians to secure and protect their NINs, urging subscribers to desist from selling their NINs or allowing others to use their NINs for registration. “For any action committed with the SIM good or bad it will be officially traced and attached to the NIN owner”, the Minister warned.”
