Expert Explains How Technology Can Help Nigeria Deal With Insecurity

Muhammad Isma’il, a Nigerian technology expert living in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), has suggested innovative and technological solutions to Nigeria’s insecurity problems. 

According to Isma’il, Nigeria’s insecurity is worsening and increasing on a daily basis, necessitating an immediate technological intervention similar to that used in developed countries.

“I believe technology can help Nigeria solve most of its security and economic problems in a very short period,” Isma’il said. Isma’il explained that the Nigerian government can use effective identity management to “provide social security, create law and order, and a well-organised society.” 

He did, however, note that “identity management can only be effective if technology is properly deployed, many people in Nigeria do not have any kind of identity document, they virtually do not exist in any government record.”

“A large number of Nigerians do not register births and deaths, and where they do, the data is rarely shared with any national database, so any statistics that emerge are usually dismissed as baseless or lacking in credibility.“

“Though there is a current effort to register each Nigerian on the database by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) by issuing a digital identity, which is a very good decision, there are several other ways to accelerate the enrolment program which was either disregarded or perhaps because of some other reasons, it was decided that this is the only way to collect people’s data.”

He urged the Nigerian government to emulate India’s Aadhaar identity management project, which has recorded over one billion people in less than ten years. 

“National Identity Management Commission was established earlier than India’s Aadhaar program in 2007, but they are struggling to enrol even 50% of the population, which is only about 20% of India’s entire population despite the many similarities between Nigeria and India in terms of education and infrastructure, these shows that something is fundamentally wrong with the way Nigeria is running its identity program, and something must be changed,” he said. 

Surveillance technology, according to the expert, should also be deployed because it has been proven to be a very important tool in preventing as well as solving cases of crime in every developed city around the world. 

He stated that, despite the fact that Nigeria has been awarding contracts for the project, little progress has been made due to corruption. He urged Nigerians to devote themselves to the fight against insecurity in their societies. 

“All of these require dedication and commitment to fight insecurity in our society,” he said.