The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has warned that millions of Nigerian children without birth registration are at risk of being excluded from essential public services and social protection programmes.
The organisation said legal identity is the foundation upon which children can access and exercise their basic rights throughout life.
The Chief of UNICEF Lagos Field Office, Celine Lafoucriere, raised the alarm at a two-day media dialogue organised by the National Population Commission (NPC), in collaboration with UNICEF, to strengthen advocacy for the registration of children under one year.
Lafoucriere described birth registration as a fundamental right, warning that children without proof of legal identity could face difficulties accessing education, healthcare, social protection and other essential services.
She said the consequences could extend into adulthood, with people without legal identity potentially facing difficulties exercising rights relating to voting, inheritance and other civic and social entitlements.
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Beyond individual rights, Lafoucriere said birth registration was critical to effective government planning and budgeting.
She explained that children who are not registered are often missing from official databases and social protection systems, making it difficult for government to accurately determine their numbers and plan adequately for their needs.
“Birth registration, civil registration is the child’s identity and it is the foundational right of every child’s rights. Without that right, nothing else can happen. If your child doesn’t have an identity, he does not exist. He or she does not exist on the social register,” she said.
According to her, accurate registration figures are essential because government interventions, including social protection programmes, are planned and funded according to the population expected to benefit.
She said many parents remain unaware of where and how to register their children, stressing that journalists are strategically positioned to bridge the information gap.
Lafoucriere urged the media to take the birth registration campaign into communities, particularly among vulnerable and hard-to-reach families.
According to her, sustained media support would be crucial to achieving significant improvements in birth registration nationwide.
The Lagos State Director of the National Population Commission, Abiola Kekere-Ekun, also called for stronger media support to increase public awareness and boost the commission’s birth registration drive.
She said parents and caregivers needed clearer information about the importance of registration and the locations where the service could be obtained.
A UNICEF Child Protection Specialist, Dennis Onoise, identified weak legal frameworks, limited access to registration facilities, inadequate data systems and low community awareness as major challenges affecting birth registration in Nigeria.
He called for legal reforms, digitisation, decentralisation, improved data systems and sustained community mobilisation to address the gaps.
Onoise said the shift from predominantly manual registration to digital systems would improve efficiency, reduce delays and make registration more accessible to families.
He also advocated stronger collaboration between the NPC and primary healthcare centres, noting that health facilities are well positioned to support birth registration because they interact with families during pregnancy, childbirth and early childhood.
According to him, taking registration services closer to communities would reduce the burden on families who may have to travel long distances to access registration facilities.
Onoise said stronger institutional collaboration, technology and unique identification numbers could make birth registration more useful to families while enabling the government to better track children and plan for their education, healthcare and social protection.
Mrs Blessing Ejiofor, UNICEF Communication Officer, said the media dialogue would focus specifically on birth registration for children under one year, stressing that a targeted approach would help achieve greater results.
She said journalists would receive relevant data, statistics and expert interviews to support their reporting on birth registration and other child-related issues.
Ejiofor urged the media to sustain reporting on birth registration, child protection, exclusive breastfeeding, and related issues over the coming months.