Yoruba elder statesman berates NIN-SIM linking policy, calls it “severe security breach”

Yoruba elder statesman berates NIN-SIM linking policy, calls it “severe security breach”

The Jagun Oodua Adimula ll of Yorubaland, High Chief Tola Adeniyi has advised the federal government to immediately stop its policy of linking the National Identity Number (NIN) of Nigerians with their sim (Subscriber Identity/Identification Module) cards, saying it exposes Nigerians to all sorts of criminals.

In a statement, Adeniyi urged the federal government to immediately “stop (Isa Ali Ibrahim) Pantami’s (former minister of Communications and Digital Economy) inimical and insidious security breach which mandated citizens to link their NIN, BVN with their telephone numbers.”

He added: “There is no place in the world where sensitive security details like NIN, otherwise known as Social Insurance Number in other countries, is placed on the open market as Pantami compelled Nigerians to do.

“The origin of this politically motivated scheming was when Buhari threw the Nigerian citizenship to all manners of migrants, particularly the Fulani from all over Africa via his reckless pronouncement in Cairo, Egypt.

“A sham legislation was enacted which purportedly conferred Nigerian citizenship on any migrant who possessed a phone number attached to NIN and lived anywhere in the country for a year or two.

“The shenanigan was meant to seriously alter the country’s demographics.

“Anybody who gains access to other people’s NIN, now made porous through phone numbers, can easily commit all manners of criminality with the vital information so garnered.

“The federal government is exposing Nigerians to local, national and international crooks and criminals with the continuation of this severe security breach.

“It must be stopped today. I call on Nigerian constitutional lawyers and security experts to step into this matter and quickly intervene and secure government compliance.”