The National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) has announced that Nigerians will bear the cost of the newly introduced multipurpose national identity cards.
Peter Iwegbu, the head of NIMC's Card Management Services, disclosed during a media roundtable in Lagos that the government lacks sufficient revenue to fund the production of these cards.
The new identity cards are designed for various uses, including identification and financial transactions, but the financial burden of their rollout will shift to citizens due to budgetary constraints.
Iwegbu said with the payment, the national identity cards would only be produced for those who need it to avoid a repetition of past mistakes of issuing physical cards to Nigerians for free, which many did not collect.
He added that in the last production attempt, over two million cards were produced but many are yet to be collected by their owners.
“The government’s limited revenue is also a major factor in the decision to make Nigerians pay for the new ID card,” he said.
In his address, Lanre Yusuf, the agency’s Director of Information Technology said the idea of a free national ID card in the past was a disaster.