A UNICEF child protection specialist has raised the alarm over the millions of Nigerian children without birth certificates, warning that the gap threatens their access to essential rights and services.
About 3.5 million children under the age of one in Nigeria’s South-West alone remain without birth registration, putting them at risk of becoming invisible in government planning and limiting their access to essential services, according to UNICEF.
Speaking at a media dialogue on birth registration organized by UNICEF in collaboration with the National Population Commission (NPC), 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.
Onoise stressed that the challenge was not simply about parents failing to register their children, but also about removing barriers that make registration difficult for families. He identified inadequate registration centres, long distances to service points, language barriers, inefficient registration processes and insufficient financial, human and material resources as factors limiting access to civil registration services.
Onoise explained that civil registration and legal identity systems were essential for generating legally recognised records and establishing every child’s right to recognition before the law. “Birth registration gives every child legal identity and provides reliable information needed by government to plan effectively for education, healthcare, social protection and other essential services,” he said.
He added that birth records provide critical identity information including a child’s name, gender, place and date of birth that can be used across government and private-sector services. According to Onoise, a birth record establishes a child’s identity and provides the foundation for recognition before the law.
Onoise called for legal reforms, digitisation, decentralisation, improved data systems and sustained community mobilisation to address the gaps. He said the shift from manual to digital registration could improve efficiency and make it easier for families to register their children.
He noted that UNICEF has provided technical and financial support, while Bankforth Technologies Ltd. developed and deployed the electronic Civil Registration and Vital Statistics system, known as VitalReg, to strengthen registration processes. “Localising registration services will bring them closer to families, remove access barriers and ensure that every birth is promptly captured, accurately recorded and legally recognised across Nigeria,” he added.
Onoise also advocated stronger collaboration between the NPC and primary healthcare facilities, noting that health facilities are strategically positioned to support birth registration because they interact with families during pregnancy, childbirth and early childhood.
Despite the challenges, Onoise expressed optimism that Nigeria could achieve universal birth registration in line with the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. He appealed to the media to support the commission by taking information about registration services to communities and encouraging parents to register their children, and urged sustained public education on birth registration as part of routine reporting on maternal, newborn and child health.
The initiative forms part of broader efforts to strengthen Nigeria’s civil registration and vital statistics system and close the gap that has left millions of children without proof of legal identity. Officials noted that children who are not registered at birth are not adequately reflected in the country’s official population records a wider governance challenge with implications for planning and service delivery.
