An arrest order has been issued to prospective racketeers of subscribers of the National Identify Number (NIN).
Oredo Local government leadership headed by Tom Obaseki issued the order for arrest after students complained of exploitation by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) officials.
The Federal Government has made it a requirement for SSCE and UME students to obtain their NIN before applying for exams.
The Standard Gazette had earlier reported how students, particularly at the Oredo Secretariat in Benin, are forced to pay N15,000-N18,000 before the officials assist them.
The officials took the desperation of the large crowd of the SSCE and UME candidates desperate to get the number.
Worried by the incessant complaint, the Chairman, Dr Tom, launched an investigation, leading to the arrest threats.
Speaking on his decision to protect the vulnerable students, Dr Tom Obaseki said, “We can not say because we are doing NIN registration activities and expose this secretariat to the risk of riots, and possible destruction of property belonging to the secretariat.
“Because of our expectative actions that are taken place here and documented unapproved exploits, which are now beginning to expose us to security crisis and posing a danger by exposing workers and could lead to setting this council on fire someday”.
Some subscribers who appreciated the move, however, called on the federal government to increase the number of machines being used in order to reduce the frustrated crowd.
In their Words, “the federal government should bring in more computers for the exercise; others they should scrap it or not make it compulsory for virtually every service in Nigeria because this is the reason they are exploiting us in this harsh economic situation we find ourselves in Nigeria.”
Explaining the slow pace, Ehiede Marvis, a supervisor at the NIMC Oredo office, attributed it to the unavailability of network services and denied any of their staff engaging in racketeering.
He says,” We try to do our work here in order to reduce the crowd just that the need work is bad and moreover we don’t collect money from anybody so we support that anybody caught should be arrested.
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Introduced on 28 August 2014 under President Goodluck JOnathan’s administration, NIN is used by the government to match citizens with their biometric data and other details in the National Identity Database.
