NIMC Act 2026: Coker-Odusote Hails Tinubu for Signing Landmark Digital Identity Law

President Bola Tinubu has signed the National Identity Management Commission Act 2026 into law, delivering what the Commission describes as the most significant reform of Nigeria’s identity management legal framework since the agency’s establishment, and one that lays the groundwork for a digitally interoperable, cybersecurity-hardened national identity ecosystem.

The signing, which has drawn formal expressions of gratitude from NIMC’s leadership, sets in motion a sweeping reconfiguration of how Nigeria manages, authenticates, and protects the digital identities of its citizens, legal residents, and diaspora population.

At the centre of the legislation is a designation that carries considerable technical and governance weight: NIMC has been formally named the Root Certification Authority for Nigeria’s National Public Key Infrastructure and Digital Public Infrastructure.

The designation is not ceremonial. A Root Certification Authority sits at the apex of a digital trust hierarchy, the foundational entity whose cryptographic authority underpins secure digital transactions, electronic authentication, and interoperable data exchange across every institution, public or private, that connects to the national identity infrastructure.

In practical terms, the designation means that NIMC will now serve as the bedrock of Nigeria’s electronic trust architecture, the institution whose authority validates whether a digital identity, document, or transaction can be considered secure and genuine within the national system.

Speaking to the significance of the legislation, Engr. Dr. Abisoye Coker-Odusote, NIMC director-general, described the Act as a historic reform that would strengthen citizens’ data protection, enhance cybersecurity, establish trusted digital identity and authentication services, and enable secure and interoperable data exchange across government and private-sector platforms.

“The NIMC Act 2026 represents the most significant reform of Nigeria’s identity management legal framework since the establishment of the Commission,” the DG said, adding that the legislation reinforced Nigeria’s commitment to building a secure, trusted, inclusive, and interoperable digital identity ecosystem capable of serving as a catalyst for national development, economic growth, digital innovation, and improved governance.

What changes for Nigerians

The legislation arrives against a backdrop of persistent identity infrastructure challenges, from the exclusion of millions of Nigerians from formal financial services due to verification failures, to the identity-linked fraud that the CBN’s own Payments System Vision 2028 has flagged as a central threat to digital financial inclusion.

NIMC has outlined a range of expected citizen outcomes from the Act’s implementation. These include wider and more convenient access to identity services, explicitly including Nigerians in the diaspora, a community that has historically faced significant friction in accessing identity documentation remotely, alongside stronger personal data protection, faster and more secure identity verification, and reduced incidence of identity theft, impersonation, and identity-related fraud.

The Act also targets a structural weakness that has constrained Nigeria’s digital economy development for years: the absence of a secure, interoperable data exchange framework spanning government institutions, financial institutions, and private-sector organisations.

By establishing NIMC as the Root Certification Authority and embedding Digital Public Infrastructure within the national legal framework, the legislation creates the technical and regulatory foundation for seamless, secure data flows across the ecosystem, a prerequisite for the kind of integrated digital services that underpin modern economies.

For Nigeria’s fintech sector in particular, the implications are significant. The CBN’s ongoing push toward 95 per cent financial inclusion by 2028, anchored in part on NIN and BVN identity integration, acquires a stronger legal and technical underpinning with NIMC’s new mandate.

Identity verification failures and authentication gaps, which have historically contributed to both financial exclusion and digital fraud, are precisely the problems the Root Certification Authority designation is designed to address at infrastructure level.

Legislative pathway

The passage of the Act received support across both chambers of the National Assembly, with the Joint Committee on Identity and National Population Commission playing a coordinating role in its legislative journey.

NIMC acknowledged the contributions of the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and distinguished members of the National Assembly in its formal statement following the signing.

The Commission also credited the Honourable Minister of the Interior, development partners including Identity for Development, and its own management and staff for the collaborative effort behind the legislation.

ID4D, the World Bank’s identification for development initiative, has been a longstanding technical and financial partner in Nigeria’s digital identity reform agenda, and its involvement in the legislative process reflects the international development architecture that has backed NIMC’s capacity-building efforts.

What comes next

NIMC has indicated that it will, in due course, issue the regulations, guidelines, and subsidiary instruments necessary to give full effect to the Act’s provisions.

The Commission described this implementation phase as one that would involve constructive engagement with government institutions, the private sector, development partners, and other key stakeholders to facilitate a seamless transition to the new legal framework.

For businesses operating in Nigeria’s digital economy, particularly those in financial services, healthcare, telecommunications, and government contracting, the subsidiary regulations that follow the Act’s signing will carry significant operational implications, defining the technical standards, compliance obligations, and authentication protocols that digital identity integration will require.

The NIMC Act 2026 arrives at a moment when digital identity infrastructure has moved from a development sector conversation into a macroeconomic priority.

With Nigeria targeting a one trillion dollar economy and a digital financial system capable of servicing a 95 per cent financially included population by 2028, the legal architecture through which identity is issued, verified, and trusted is no longer a background policy question.

It is, as the legislation now formally recognises, the foundation everything else is built on.

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