Why Kenyans should collect identity cards

What makes people spend their time and money to travel to national registration centres and apply for crucial identification documents only to disappear, leaving such papers gathering dust in the offices for years?

We ask this because of media reports that thousands of identification cards and birth certificates are lying uncollected at Huduma Centres across the country, uncollected months and years since the owners applied for them. 

While on a tour of Kajiado and Nakuru counties, Principal Secretary for Public Service Mary Kimonye revealed that more than 180,000 identification cards and 6,000 birth certificates have yet to be collected by applicants in the area.

Kimonye noted that the Kajiado and Nakuru cases are replicated in many parts of the country where the vital documents are lying uncollected in registration centres.

This should not be the case at all. So because the identity papers are vital in the daily lives of citizens.

Indeed, the two documents are crucial in all business and social transactions in Kenya.

Be it financial credit and clearance of medical bills or cellular money transfer, school admission, shopping, voting, marriage, travel, entertainment, digital communication and citizenship services.

It is, therefore, the height of mischief and absolute irresponsibility for any Kenyan to purport to be living comfortably without any form of identification paper. That is neither ignorance nor naivety, it’s simply carelessness.

The government has established some poverty-alleviating programmes such as the Uwezo Fund and Youth Enterprise Fund through which women and youth can apply for soft loans to kick-start  businesses.

For one to qualify and exploit such opportunities, they must – of all other requirements- have a national identification card.

The same applies to bank loans and other financial lenders such as Saccos, chamas and mobile phone credit.

A person who does not want to take advantage of such openings is not only a liability to themselves but to the country.

Failing to collect these crucial documents has in the past seen some people who are eligible to vote miss out on important decisions which have a direct bearing on their welfare.

Cases of such people engaging in last-minute rush to obtain IDs so they can vote for their preferred candidates are only too common during election time.

Perhaps it’s time the national and county governments considered a way of sanctioning the culprits of this strange behaviour to save time and resources expended in preparing and storing these documents.