CS Joseph Nkaissery orders chiefs to release thousands of identity cards

Interior Cabinet secretary Joseph Nkaissery has given chiefs two days to distribute all the national identity cards that had been released to their offices.

Nkaissery said it was unfair that Kenyans would wait for long to have the cards when they were indeed lying idle at the chiefs' offices in location headquarters.

"I order that all chiefs across the country release thousands of IDs in their possession by Monday to ensure those who had applied can use them. It is totally unfair for the chiefs to hold the IDs when the owners were suffering," said Nkaissery.

Speaking when he appeared before the National Assembly's Implementation Committee, the CS also said there had been financial shortfalls that had affected production of the IDs but exuded confidence that the exercise would move faster immediately the 2016/2017 ministry's allocation was released.

Kwanza MP Ferdinand Wanyonyi had raised an issue on the delay in the issuance of the IDs in his constituency despite the fact that he had facilitated the movement of registration officers.

.

Keep Reading

•  Government splashes Sh100m for tourists comfort zones in counties
•  All our constitutional reform initiatives have been on roller coaster
•  Human cases of bird flu 'an enormous concern': WHO
•  Ruto in Times 100 most influential people
•  EACC recovers Sh100 million land in NakuruPremium

National Registration Bureau Director Reuben Kimotho said there were 600,000 IDs yet to be collected across counties.

Kimotho said there was no backlog of the IDs produced given that they had produced all the cards that were applied for by March 31.

"We had financial constraint last year, we could not even pay our debtors leave alone buy new material for production of IDs. However, we have cleared any backlog that had been created last year and are now trying to ensure that we are up to date and can go in tandem with our service charter that demands we produce them between 20-40 days of application," said Kimotho.

Kimotho said that from January alone they had produced 1 million IDs. He admitted there had been problems in the proper production of some IDs last year because they had used the officers from other departments to register more people in an effort to reduce the backlog.