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The Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, has described digital identity as a critical trust layer for Nigeria’s emerging digital economy, arguing that its real value lies not in identification alone but in opening secure access to services and economic opportunities.
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Abdullahi made the case during a high-level panel session, “Identity in Action and Access to the Digital Economy,” convened by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) as part of discussions on “The Digital Public Ecosystem: Identity, Trust & Inclusive Access” at the 81st United Nations General Assembly (UNGA81).
The session examined how digital identity can support inclusive access to digital services and strengthen interoperable digital public infrastructure.
Digital Identity Goes Beyond a Number
Speaking on how Nigeria can use digital identity to expand access to services, Abdullahi argued that the concept should not be reduced to a card, number or registration exercise.
“Digital identity is the trust layer of the digital economy,” he said.
According to the NITDA chief, trusted digital identity can provide the foundational infrastructure upon which authorised innovators, businesses and government service providers can build, reducing the need for different institutions to repeatedly create separate identity and verification systems.
Such an approach, he said, could accelerate customer onboarding, reduce verification costs and expand trusted digital services across sectors including financial technology, healthcare, education, agriculture, insurance and government.
Interoperability Could Change How Nigerians Access Services
Abdullahi used the experience of a farmer to illustrate how interoperable digital public infrastructure could work in practice.
Under such an ecosystem, a farmer could establish identity through the National Identification Number (NIN), verify eligibility through an agricultural platform, receive support through a payment infrastructure and interact with authorised government systems through trusted data exchange.
The farmer would not necessarily have to repeatedly submit the same information to different institutions at every stage.
The example highlights one of the potential benefits of interoperable digital infrastructure: allowing different authorised systems to work together while reducing duplication in identity verification and service delivery.
From Identity Registration to Digital Utility
For Abdullahi, Nigeria’s next challenge is to move beyond the scale of identity registration and convert digital identity into practical, trusted utility.
His message was captured in another statement from the NITDA chief: “Digital identity is not the destination; it is the doorway.”
The distinction is significant.
A population-wide identity system can establish who an individual is, but its broader economic value depends on whether that identity can securely interact with other systems to enable access to services and opportunities.
That could include financial services, healthcare, education, agricultural support, insurance and government programmes.
Digital Public Infrastructure Needs Trust
The NITDA DG linked the future of digital identity to the broader development of interoperable Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI).
In this model, identity becomes one of the foundational components through which citizens and authorised service providers interact across different digital systems.
The emphasis on trust is particularly important because interoperability requires institutions to exchange and verify information while maintaining appropriate controls around access and use.
For Nigeria, the objective outlined by Abdullahi is therefore not simply to expand the number of people with recognised digital identities, but to create an ecosystem in which those identities can be safely and productively used.
High-Level Panel Brings Government and Industry Together
Abdullahi participated in the panel alongside Senator Ibrahim Hassan Hadejia, Deputy Chief of Staff to the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria; Aderemi Adebowale, National Coordinator of the Renewed Hope National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme; and Olugbenga Agboola, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Flutterwave.
The session was moderated by Diwura Oladepo, Executive Director of Technology for Social Change and Development (Tech4Dev).
The mix of government, public-service and private-sector participants reflected the cross-sector nature of digital identity and digital public infrastructure, which increasingly cut across financial services, social programmes, technology platforms and government services.
The Bigger Digital Economy Opportunity
The discussion places digital identity within a broader question facing Nigeria: how can foundational digital infrastructure translate into tangible economic participation?
For millions of Nigerians, particularly those outside major urban centres, the value of digital transformation will ultimately be measured by whether it makes essential services easier to access and creates new opportunities to participate in the formal digital economy.
Abdullahi’s argument is that trusted digital identity can provide part of that foundation.
Instead of treating identity as an end in itself, Nigeria can use it as an enabling layer through which citizens interact securely with multiple digital services.
Identity as a Gateway to Inclusion
The NITDA DG’s message at UNGA81 ultimately reframed digital identity from an administrative function into an economic enabler.
The ambition is to build a trusted and interoperable digital ecosystem in which Nigerians can access services and participate in the digital economy regardless of geography, gender or economic circumstances.
For Nigeria’s digital transformation agenda, the challenge ahead is therefore increasingly about turning identity infrastructure into everyday utility—connecting people not merely to a verified identity, but to the services, opportunities and economic participation that a trusted digital economy can provide.
