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Banks fail to begin biometric registration

By BusinessNews Staff on June 7, 2014

Deposit Money Banks, for the third time, failed to commence the biometric registration of their customers last week.

This development is coming up almost four months after the suspended governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Mr. Lamido Sanusi, inaugurated the project.

The biometric registration exercise is expected to lead to the issuance to all bank customers across the country, a uniform and unique identification number called Bank Verification Number.

The BVN will help to prevent identify theft, fraud and enhance credit advancement to customers.

Investigation by our correspondent revealed that banks could not commence biometric registration of their customers last week, contrary to the joint announcement by the CBN and companies handling the project that the exercise would commence May ending.

This now makes it the third time the Bankers’ Committee had failed to commence the registration exercise, following botched attempts in February and April this year.

The suspended CBN governor, Sanusi, on February 14, had inaugurated the biometric project at the CBN head office in Lagos, with the registration of customers expected to commence a week later.

However, the team handling the project – comprising of the officials of Nigeria Inter-bank Settlement System Plc, Chams Plc and Dermalog of Germany – had said the registration of bank customers would commence on April 1 after the Site Acceptance Test.

The team had said the registration exercise would commence in 48 bank offices (head office and a choice branch for 24 banks) before the scope would be expanded.

Investigation had shown that only 48 bank offices out of the over 5,500 in the country have been installed with the hardware needed for the biometric registration exercise.

But in April, the CBN said that the registration exercise would be rolled out in 1,000 bank branches in Lagos in May ending.

The Acting Director, Corporate Communications, CBN, Mr. Isaac Okorafor, said lessons learnt from the public rollout in Lagos would form the basis of taking the registration exercise to other parts of the country later in the year.

He had said, “Already, the project is ongoing in some bank branches. We also intend that by the end of May 2014, we will begin to roll out to members of the public, just as we did during the cashless programme.

“You know our people are not very educated; they are resistant to anything that has to do with money. However, what we intend to do is to start the public rollout here in Lagos, which has more of the bank branches.

“We are starting with at least 1,000 bank branches. After the enrolment of account holders, we will look at the challenges that are there, how to tackle those challenges and the wisdom we get from there will now help us to begin to plan a rollout after Lagos.”

The Nigeria Inter-bank Settlement System Plc is coordinating the project, sponsored by the Bankers Committee.

Sanusi had said that after the 18-month registration period, bank customers would not be able to do any banking transaction without their fingerprints.

He had noted that the development represented a milestone in the nation’s financial system and economy in general, adding that it would help to mitigate fraud, money laundering and other vices.

CBN spokespersons, Okoroafor, had said that a number of challenges confronting the banking sector, ranging from fraud to low level of literacy in the country, led to the emergence the BVN project.

He pointed out that a significant number of people could not key into the central bank’s cashless policy due to illiteracy.

He, however, noted that the BVN would enable a bank customer to have a single identity within the financial system.

The officer in charge of the biometric project at the NIBSS, Mr. Adenumosun, did not respond to e-mail enquiries on the project when contacted on Wednesday.

A CBN spokesman said efforts were being made to fast track the project, noting that, “the project is the first of its kind in Nigeria and there is need to ensure everything is okay.”

[Punch]

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