FG unveils mobile ID registration centres for displaced persons

The Federal Government has launched a mobile documentation initiative targeting 3.7 million internally displaced persons and other vulnerable Nigerians, with 10 states selected for the first phase.

The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction, Dr Bernard Doro, disclosed this at the handover ceremony of the vehicles to beneficiary states on Wednesday at the United Nations House in Abuja.

The minister described the intervention as part of efforts to move vulnerable Nigerians from emergency relief to sustainable poverty reduction.

He said the initiative, tagged One Motor, Plenty Services, will provide National Identification Numbers, birth certificates, Bank Verification Numbers, SIM registration, bank account opening and enrolment in the National Social Register through 10 specially equipped mobile centres

Doro added that the initiative was designed to address the difficulties displaced persons face in accessing government services due to distance, displacement and lack of identity documents.

“For millions of our citizens, the problem is not merely that services do not exist. The problem is that those services most often do not reach them,” he said.

The minister explained that many displaced persons were excluded from government assistance and economic opportunities because they lacked the documents required to access essential services.

“This matters because ID is the first step out of poverty. You cannot be paid if you cannot be identified. You cannot be protected if you cannot be counted. Every NIN issued and every account opened from these vehicles is a person moving from the margins into the system,” he added.

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Doro urged the beneficiary states to ensure the vehicles were properly maintained and regularly deployed, warning against allowing them to become abandoned government assets.

“These units must not sit in government car parks. They must be fuelled, maintained, secured and kept on the road, reaching the last camp, the last village and the last family,” he said.

He expressed hope that the initiative would be expanded from 10 states to all 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory.

The beneficiary states are Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Katsina, Sokoto, Taraba, Yobe and Zamfara.

The programme is supported by the German government through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.