By Michael Oriedo
Soon, we will give national identity cards to newborns
To a teenager, an identity card is a very crucial document, not in the sense that it will help them conduct some official business. An ID card is a tool of empowerment of sorts.
Getting the much-sought card, to them, is a rite of passage. It transforms one from childhood to adulthood. Put it differently, in most teenagers minds, it gives one a right to drink alcohol and engage in other nefarious activities associated with adulthood.
That is why Immigration minister Otieno Kajwang’s announcement that the Government is working hard to ensure 12-year-olds acquire ID cards is a cause for worry. And the reason behind the move raises even more suspicions.
The minister notes that at 12, one’s thumbprint is developed therefore, should be given an ID card. Giving children the card just because their fingerprints have developed, if you ask PointBlank, is pedestrian.
After 12-year-olds, will Kajwang’ go for newborns? Why can’t the resources be used to ensure getting the documents for those who hit 18 is a smooth process devoid of graft, as many PointBlank readers have observed.
Is Kewu sitting on Sh409,177 payment?
When one hears about trade unions, what comes to mind is the haki yetu (our rights) song. This is because the institutions fight for peoples’ rights, which include salary increments.
But Mr Ben Molo, a member of a group of seven former employees of Hasika Enterprises in Kisumu believes Kenya Engineering Workers’ Union (Kewu), which is under Central Organisation of Trade Union, has failed them.
“Having been summarily dismissed by our employer after discovering we had joined Kewu, the union took the matter to Industrial Court,” he recounts.
