The World Bank has said that Nigeria will now receive funds from the World Bank for the implementation of its Identity for Development initiative because the country has enacted a data protection law.
The signing of Nigeria’s data protection law into law satisfied the requirement for the release of funds from the International Development Association, European Investment Bank, and French Development Agency, according to the World Bank’s most recent report on the implementation of the ID4D project in Nigeria.
The bank announced that enrollment for National ID under the project will now begin in July.
The project’s documentation states that IDA will provide Nigeria with a credit of $115 million for the implementation, while the French Agency for Development is backing it with $100 million.
The project is also co-financed with $215 million from the European Investment Bank.
The bank noted the enhancements that have been made to the project’s implementation and said:
“In June 2023, the data protection law was passed and made official. This law will establish a data protection commission to oversee the processing of personal information and provide a legal framework for the protection of personal information.
“The International Development Association, European Investment Bank, and French Development Agency can now enlist without the disbursement requirement thanks to the passage of the data protection law, and Pilot enrollment under the Project is projected to commence in July 2023.”
The project’s development goal, according to the bank, is to expand the number of people who have a national ID number that is issued by a strong and inclusive foundational ID system that makes it easy to access services.
By June 2024, 148 million Nigerians are anticipated to have received their National Identification Numbers under the ID4D program.
NIMC reported that 101 million people have been enrolled as of June this year.
In addition to giving NIN to 148 million Nigerians by 2024, the Bank specified additional goals, such as issuing NIN to at least 65 million female Nigerians and 50 million young people under the age of 16 by that date.
However, despite the fact that the data made public by the NIMC did not include the number of children who have been captured, it did show that as of June 26, 2023, 43.7 million females had received NINs.
Other performance indicators set for the country include the development of pro-poor functional public and private services employing the foundational ID system for authentication and service delivery; NIN enrolments in rural areas; Government personnel trained in best practices for legal and regulatory enabling environments for foundational ID, including privacy and data protection, all of which must have been achieved by June 2024.
