Former President Olusegun Obasanjo yesterday described his Owu tribal marks as the natural identity card with which he had been operating since he was born.
Obasanjo also disclosed that with his collection of the new National ID card, his possession of an international passport and his Owu tribal marks on each side of his cheeks, he now had to operate with three means of identification as a Nigerian.
The former president, who in his characteristic jocular manner, said this while collecting his new e-card from the management of the National Identity Management Commission, that brought the card to him in his Presidential Hill Top Mansion in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital. He, however, spent more than 10 minutes to activate the e-card and its other in-built applications.
Obasanjo wondered why the process for the enrolment, activation and collection of his card took so much time, despite his status and the special treatment given to him by the NIMC management.
He also queried why he was being issued the e-card at this point in time when he had become ‘unemployed and unemployable’.
Obasanjo, therefore, expressed fears about the hardship and delay the people at the grassroots would have to endure whenever the process for the capture of their biometric data commenced.
The former president also enquired from the NIMC management team, led by its Director General, Mr. Chris Onyemenam, how the applications in the e-card would be of benefit to the people back in places like his rural Ibogun in Ifo Local Government Area of the state, and what it would cost them to make use of such applications, taking into considering their level of poverty.
“Not many people know that I have three identity cards. The first is the International Passport, the second is the National Identity card and the third is my tribal marks. It is not funny that I am collecting the National Identity card at a time that I am unemployed and unemployable.
“What we have now is what we wanted to do in 1979 but not as complex as this one and also not as sophisticated as this. Although we are getting the card late, but we are getting the best that technology can offer.
“I have my worries and I always express my feelings. I have got special treatment but how will it be for someone in my village to be captured?
“How much of this functionality in the card will be useful to him and how much will be paid knowing that poverty is still ravaging the rural dwellers. These are issues you will have to address,” he said.
Obasanjo, however, expressed hope that the ongoing e-card project would assist the country in addressing its security challenges and also serve as a means for the security agencies to gather intelligence reports.
He further disclosed that when the idea of a national ID card first mooted in 1979, its estimated cost was just N16 million then.
Obasanjo expressed regret that the cost of the project had now risen astronomically to “billions and billions of naira,” due mainly to the sophistication of the card.
The former president, however, noted that the national ID card scheme was long overdue.
Onyemenam in his response said the observations made by the former president had been noted, adding that the commission was already putting in place logistics arrangement to ensure that people in the hinterlands and the creeks were equally and adequately registered for the scheme.
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