Cabinet waives ID requirement for underage students seeking gov’t funding
By Wycliffe Nyamasege, August 29, 2023
Students who are yet to attain the age of 18 years will now be able to access government scholarships for their tertiary education after the Cabinet waived the requirement for national identity cards.
The resolution was reached during a Cabinet meeting chaired by President William Ruto at the Kakamega State Lodge on Tuesday, August 29.
“Cabinet waived the requirement for national identity cards for students who have not attained the age of 18,” Cabinet said in a statement.
This means that the 2022 KCSE candidates recently placed into higher institutions of learning by the Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Service (KUCCPS) will apply for funding using their birth certificates.
The Cabinet further directed the Ministry of Education, jointly with all stakeholders, to fast-track access to scholarships for all eligible students.
The declaration is a reprieve for thousands of university students who had been locked out of government funding for lack of ID cards.
Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) CEO Charles Ringera recently said the agency would not issue scholarships to students who were yet to obtain identification documents.
In a statement, Ringera stated that the board would withhold the funds until the underage applicants acquire IDs.
“An ID is important for identifying the identity of the student especially when they are repaying the loan,” Ringera stated.
Most parents, who spoke to the media recently, said they were facing challenges raising school fees due to the current economic hardships.
The government launched the New Higher Education Funding(NHEF) model for both scholarships and loans for students placed in tertiary institutions last month.
The launch followed the Kenya Kwanza administration’s move to overhaul the higher education student funding model by aligning placement, government scholarships and loans to the needs of students and their programme costs.
Under the new model, funding will be apportioned according to a student’s levels of need classified into four; vulnerable, extremely needy, needy and less needy.