UNICEF, FG Collaborate to Digitise Birth Registration in Nigeria

The federal government and the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) are joining hands to digitise birth registration in the country starting from October.

Emelia Allan, a child protection manager with UNICEF, Kano, disclosed this in Kano at a two-day capacity-building workshop for journalists from Katsina, Kano, and Jigawa.

The workshop was organised by the Kano State-owned Abubakar Rimi Television (ARTV).

“Arrangement on the planned exercise has gone far, with Kano State as the pilot state,” Ms. Allan said, adding that the success of Kano will determine the spread of the exercise.

“We are doing our best on child rights protection with the government agreed on five key areas, including law and policies in line with international standards.

“Also, increasing birth registration is among the key areas. The good news is that Kano is piloting the digital birth registration system we are supporting the government with.

“We want to digitise birth registration, the manual registration is part of the processes that are making birth registration low.

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“The government wants to digitise the system, and Kano is piloting it in all the 44 local government areas in the state, so we are working towards that.”

Ms. Allan said that the digital registration of children will go directly to the system and a digital certificate will be printed, not like that of the manual system.

Earlier, the Kano UNICEF chief, Rahama Farah said the capacity-building workshop was to enhance the capacity of journalists on reporting children and women issues.

Mr. Farah, represented by a UNICEF Communication Specialist, Samuel Kaalu, tasked journalists to focus more on issues affecting vulnerable children and women.

He said that malnutrition and underage marriage are still rampant and many school-age children, especially girls, still do not have access to education.

“2023 is approaching, politicians and candidates campaigning to hold various positions, the media should get them to make a commitment on how they intend to tackle some of these issues if they get to office.

“The world should know the situation of children in Nigeria to the extent that if you marry off an underage girl, she may never get the opportunity to go to school.”