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About 32 million active bank accounts have yet to be enrolled on the Biometric Verification Number (BVN), the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said in a statement on Friday.
CBN Director, Corporate Communications, Mu’azu Ibrahim, said the apex bank was concerned by the number of account owners yet to enroll, considering that the exercise would end by October 31.
The statement read:
“The emerging statistical trend of the BVN registration exercise shows that there are about 52 million active bank accounts in various banks.
“Out of this, total enrollment stands at about 20 million, out of which about 14 million accounts have been found linked to the BVN as of September, 2015.
“The question now is whether bank customers have been taking advantage of the extension to complete their BVN registration and also ensure that their various bank accounts have been linked to the BVN.”
Recall that the CBN had initially put the deadline of BVN registration at June 30 but postponed it to October 31 because of low enrollment.
According to the CBN, after the initial rush from June ending to July, there had been a steady decline in new BVN enrollment figures for August and September.
The CBN in collaboration with all banks in Nigeria on February 14, 2014, inaugurated the BVN, which is a centralised biometric identification system for the banking industry.
The system, the CBN said, is aimed at addressing issues of identity theft and fraud; helping to discover blacklisted customers as well as encouraging banks to grant loans to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises and students in the country.