Between 7-9 October, IOM’s missions in Niger and Estonia, together with IOM’s Regional Office in Brussels, organized a joint study visit to Estonia. A delegation from Niger led by Minister - Special Advisor to the President of the Republic of Niger and Director General of the National Agency for the Information Society (ANSI), Mr. Ibrahima Guimba Saidou, together with Nigerien Immigration/Border Police (DST) representatives, traveled to Estonia to meet with government officials.

The visit was organized as a follow-up event after the visit of Mr. Schaer, Special Envoy of the President of Estonia, to Niamey earlier this year. The meetings with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Economics and Communications, and Police & Border Guards allowed both countries to discuss common challenges around migration, security and digitalization.

According to the World Bank Dataset (2018), 30% of Niger’s population is unregistered, and there is a need for a complete system for identity management, including civil registries and vital statistics (CRVS). One of the long-term goals is to also make it possible for citizens within the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to travel within the region using biometric national ID cards. 

The visit aimed to support the Government of Niger in implementing new strategies and technologies of immigration management, starting with new methods of identification for both its citizens and foreigners seeking to enter the country, as well as ways of improving its e-governance capacities to better communicate online, inside and outside the country.

Since 2015, IOM’s Immigration and Border Management (IBM) unit in Niger has been implementing projects aimed at strengthening border management at national and regional levels, through various activities including trainings for national authorities, support for the establishment of border posts, the rehabilitation of infrastructures essential for border communities and the development of the IOM Migration Information and Data Analysis System (MIDAS) system.

Over the past two decades, Estonia has built an entire e-governance system laying foundations to an effective and sustainable digital society. The country has successfully demonstrated that a centralized online identity management system is the foundation for preventing identity theft and has become a leading country in the areas of electronic identity (eID), e-voting, and e-residency, a government-issued digital identity that provides access to Estonia’s transparent digital business environment.

Information and communications technology (ICT) is used to full extent within the country to enhance the  cooperation between the public and private sectors and to improve the quality of life, increase economic productivity and make the public sector more efficient.

The delegation also met with the E-Governance Academy (eGA), a nonprofit, nongovernmental organization based in Tallinn, that provides services related to ID management to interested countries, based on Estonian expertise and best practices.

Through this visit, the two countries, both non-permanent UN Security Council members for 2 years as of January 2020, expressed their wish for a strengthened cooperation. Minister Guimba expressed his gratitude for the visit, which falls into Niger’s bilateral cooperation strategic agenda, and which will help the Governemnt of Niger to move towards E-governance.

For more information, please contact Monica Chiriac at IOM Niger at Tel: +227 8931 8764, Email: mchiriac@iom.int.