By Adekunle Adekoya

IT seems that the is sue of SIM Card registration and the attendant controversies since the project was mooted and executed last year is not about to recede from the front-burner status it somehow acquired.

That in itself is not surprising because as Nigerians, we all know ourselves, and we have peculiar ways of doing things in such a way that what is routine in other climes becomes herculean here, and if I may say so, vice-versa, given the seriousness we attach to certain issues and the cavalier manner we treat others.

Looked at properly, SIM card registration, as conceptualised and executed was a necessary thing; there just had to be a database for all active lines in the country, along with the owners. With the benefit of hindsight, it is now clear that if SIM cards were registered as they were bought when the GSM firms rolled out in 2001, the story would have been different, and perhaps, the present controversy might not have arisen at all.

It is almost easy to forget that once upon a time there was a telephone monopoly in this country called NITEL. NITEL was both an operator and a regulator, at least in so far as the military conquistadores let it run. If we have not totally forgotten NITEL, then we would remember that it published telephone directories in which all operational lines were listed; it was easy to link up anybody who had a telephone line; all you needed do is look up his/her name in the directory.

In many countries of the world today, the telephone directory is still in use, and remains a good tool for tracing people. Where things stand today, the NITEL telephone directory is the equivalent of the national SIM card database. Since we did not make people register lines at the point of purchase in 2001 because we were too eager to talk and shout at the highest pitches of our voices, we then had to do SIM card registration.

Everyday people are being born and people are dying, so there is registration of births and deaths; birth and death certificates are written nationwide virtually everyday. Similarly, phones will get lost and SIM cards will be corrupted. On the flip side, owners of registered lines will die and new users of (mobile) phones will come of age.

As such, SIM card registration WILL be a continuous, unending exercise. One of the things I think should engage the minds of those who are interested in SIM card registration is what becomes of a line whose owner dies. What should the regulator do about that? What should the networks do about that? If my grandma dies, should her line become mine, when it was registered in her name with her biometrics?

Is it not possible for me to do funny things with my late grandma’s phones, knowfully well that if a trace is mounted, all they’ll get are the wrinkled face of an old woman and fingerprints whose owners have left the terrestrial for the celestial?

Finally, if we were to print telephone directories for the over 90 million lines in use now, how much would it cost us as a nation? Would N6.1 billion be sufficient? How much did we spend to print ballot papers for less than 70 million voters? Don’t forget that NITEL could easily print its directories; it had only a little more than 400,000 lines to bother with.