Insurers want regulator to weed out quacks

Nairobi; Kenya: Insurance agents want the industry’s regulator, the Insurance Regulation Authority (IRA) to bring sanity to the sector by cracking down on unregistered operators. Through their umbrella body, Bima Intermediaries Association of Kenya (BIA), the insurers claim their business is under threat because of a few unscrupulous operators who are unrecognised by the regulator.

Speaking in Bungoma County over the weekend, after a meeting with insurance agents from Western Kenya region, BIA Kenya Chairman Washington Ndegea said the quacks are giving licensed operators a bad name. “There are about 4,288 insurance agents licensed by IRA in Kenya. But we have more than 10,000 operators in the industry, which means more than half of the people in the sector are operating illegally,” said Mr Ndegea.

“We are calling upon IRA to ensure there is professionalism in this sector, which made more than Sh100 billion last year alone. There are low accountability levels among these unlicensed operators,” said the chairman. He blamed the country’s low insurance uptake on lack of professionalism in the sector, which has seen some members of the public fleeced. “A paltry three per cent of Kenyans have taken an insurance cover. IRA should do its work diligently to ensure there is public confidence in the sector, like in other countries such as South Africa where over 14 per cent of the citizens have a cover,” explained Ndegea.

He said they officially launched a Western branch of Bima Intermediaries Association of Kenya during the meeting with the operators from the region. “We have chosen Bungoma to be our regional hub in Western Kenya. All insurance agents in the region should liaise with our officials in the county,” said Mr Ndegea.