COVID-19: Nigerians furious at NIMC as crowd besieges office for NIN

Nigerians have faulted the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) after a crowd of potential NIN registrants besieged its office in Alausa, Ikeja area of Lagos in apparent violation of COVID-19 protocols.

This came a few days after the nationwide recorded its highest-ever daily infection rate as the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 confirmed that the nation was experiencing a second wave of the pandemic.

The Herald gathered that the crowd of Nigerians was at NIMC’s office to register for their national identity number pursuant to the Federal Government’s directive that Nigerians must synchronise their SIM card registration with their NIN or get blocked by their telecom service providers.

Disturbing photos circulating on social media showed the NIN registrants, many of whom did not use their face masks, milling around the registration point.

See photos:

Many Nigerians who took to Twitter berated NIMC for not putting measures in place to forestall such a huge crowd from gathering at its office, and posing a public health challenge.

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A Twitter influencer, Wale Adetona called on Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu to order the NIMC office’s closure like he did popular club Cubana over violation of COVID-19 guidelines.

“Dear @jidesanwoolu, when are you going to order the closure of NIMC office at Alausa for flouting the recent Covid-19 guidelines?” he queried.

Victor Babatunde wrote, “They canceled all concerts because of Covid-19 but here’s NIMC, a government office filled with hundreds of people.

“This government is tactless!!!”

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@Daddy_Nomso wrote, “Lagos Govt arrested people at Cubana on Saturday because of Covid-19 but are okay with thousands queueing at NIMC office to get NIN as they have bribed Covid to go on Xmas Holiday.

“This could have been done digitally but God forbid Nigeria does something healthy even in a pandemic.”