New identity cards will be ready before Dec – NIMC
The National Identity Management System (NIMC) will start issuing the new electronic based identity cards to Nigerians before December, the agency Director General Barrister Chris Onyemenam has said.
Barrister Onyemenam disclosed this in Abuja last week during the presentation of International Organization for Standardization ISO 27001:2005 certification to NIMC by the British Standards Institute (BSI).
He said the agency has put every necessary things in place to ensure a smooth launch of the issuance of the identity cards to Nigerians at a yet to be announced date.
President Goodluck Jonathan had given the agency December 2014 Deadline for the issuance of the cards to Nigerians.
But the DG said yesterday that the cards would be ready before that time.
He said cynicisms expressed by some Nigerians about the scheme will be totally dispelled when the cards are eventually out “soon”.
He also said the international recognised certification NIMC got from a British standard organisation showed that the agency’s identity scheme is on right track.
According to him, NIMC infrastructure has been certified to comply with global standards by BSI.
The management of NIMC had taken appropriate steps to implement an Information Security Management System with the assistance of a local partner which led to the recent independent audit and subsequent certification of the Commission, he said.
He explained that this was done to ensure that the integrity of the NIMS infrastructure especially as it concerns the National Identity Database (NID) is not compromised.
According to him, the ISO 27001:2005 certification formally specifies a management system that brings information security under explicit management control.
With this ISO 27001:2005 certification, the commission is assured that all NIMC information is protected as the ISO 27001: 2005 certification is the foremost auditable information security standard subscribed to by about 150 countries globally, he said.