Government admits issuing IDs to aliens

By Ali Abdi

A number of foreigners, especially from Somalia, have fraudulently acquired Kenyan identity cards.

Isiolo DC Waweru Kimani admitted some Somalis had penetrated the vetting committee in the district and helped foreigners obtain the crucial document.

Mr Kimani also told journalists yesterday he had disbanded the previous committee and moved its operation close to his office.

‘‘It is increasingly becoming difficult to fight the cartel. As a Government, we must come up with other ways other than relying on the vetting committee to issue identity cards," he said.

The vetting committee comprises elders from every clan, the Provincial Administration and office of the Registrar of Persons. The team vets youths applying for IDs.

Rich relatives

Foreigners, mostly from Somalia and Ethiopia, had moved to Isiolo to get IDs and birth certificates after the Government sealed loopholes in the border districts of Mandera, Garissa and Moyale.

"The foreigners, with relatives in Europe and North America, often have a lot of money and use it to bribe officials and elders," said Mr Yussuf Dogo, Friends of Nomads International Co-ordinator.

In Isiolo, it is reported that elders work in cahoots with chiefs to give foreigners the documents after receiving bribes ranging between Sh20,000 and Sh50,000.

Sources said a Kenyan Somali who had fled to the war-torn country during the shifta wars in the mid-1960s, and came back after the fall of President Siad Barre’s regime, is a member of the vetting committee.

A chief is alleged to have pushed the man’s appointment to the committee.

"How can a man whose citizenship is in doubt be a member of such a crucial committee? This is where the Provincial Administration went wrong. This man represents the interest of foreigners," said a Somali elder who requested anonymity.

When the DC inquired from a DO how the Somali clan picked its representative, he was told the chief gave his name.

It also emerged that the chief had relied on a few elders.

 

 

Read all about: Kenyan identity cards IDs

 

 

---