In Nigeria, the government’s record of human rights violations has made citizens worried that a new policy connecting their mobile phones to national identity numbers will lead to increased surveillance.
In May 2021, the Nigerian federal ministry of communications and digital economy released a revised National Identity Policy for SIM Card Registration. The policy contained a prefacing mandate letter from President Muhammadu Buhari that directed Minister Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami to ensure that no SIM card is allowed access to the Nigerian telecommunications network unless it has a National Identity Number (NIN) attached to it. The Nigerian government had previously initiated the registration of existing SIM cards in 2013. However, as of May 2021, they reported millions of unregistered and improperly registered SIM cards still accessing mobile network services.
Following years of encouragement to register, Nigerian mobile network users reported that the renewed policy enforcement came by...
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