Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi has explained why Kenyans in the Diaspora, especially in the United States, have delays in getting their National Identity cards.
Speaking when he appeared before the Senate plenary to respond to questions, Mudavadi said some of these delays are occasioned by their registration on the e-Citizen platform.
He noted that some of the Kenyans abroad register to receive their One Time Pin (OTP), which allows one to log into the system, through their US phone numbers, and this makes it difficult for them to receive the OTP.
“Some of the challenges that have occasioned delays include the following, issuance of registration on e-Citizen, where the system sometimes rejects foreign numbers, where the One Time Password has to be sent to the particular phone number used for the registration.
“We are now sensitizing the Diaspora to use the email option,” Mudavadi said.
The Prime CS, who also doubles up as the Foreign and Diaspora Affairs CS said the other challenge that has occasioned the delays is that the process is manual.
He went on to state that the manual process includes verification from the National Registration Bureau.
Mudavadi added that whenever clarification is needed during the registration, the request comes through the Kenyan mission, which has to find the applicants for clarification.
This, he said, makes the process longer.
“The processing of ID cards is entirely manual, and verification of applications has to be done by the National Registration Bureau. This causes a bit of delay, especially at missions that are not well-staffed. In addition, in the event of queries, the request has to be channelled back to the Mission to seek clarity from the applicant.”
Mudavadi further stated that the court case filed against the new IDs (Maisha Number) also slowed down the process, adding that it has now picked up and production is normal.
He added that there are also instances where Kenyans applied for IDs and have not made a point of collecting them from the missions.
The Prime CS highlighted a case of eight individuals who applied for IDs, which were processed, but when they were sent to addresses they had given, the IDs got returned because they were the wrong addresses.
The question on ID card delaying was asked by Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna, who also wanted to know what the government is doing to mitigate the situation.