Government to Issue Kenyan Kids Six Years Or Older with IDs

The government has revealed plans to issue identity cards to six-year-old children under the Huduma Namba program.

The special IDs dubbed Minor’s Huduma Card will be issued once a child attains the age of six, according to Interior Principal Secretary Dr. Karanja Kibicho. 

He explained that babies will be assigned a unique number upon birth, which will be used to register them for the Minor’s Huduma Card when they turn six.

“When you are born you get a birth notification, after which a birth certificate with a number is generated. Then at the age of six; you go to a school where the Ministry of Education will want to register you under the National Education Management Information System (Nemis) and give you a Nemis Number,” the PS explained.

The same number will be used when applying for a national identity card when the kids are 18 years old.

Kibicho said the government settled for six-year-olds because, at this age, one’s facial biometrics are well-formed, and can be captured.

Similarly, there will be a special Huduma Card designated for foreign nationals and refugees living in the country.

Last week, Kibicho announced the government will soon roll out the second round of Huduma Namba mass registration while the mass production of e-cards will commence in December.

Kibicho pointed out that the cards will have an electronic cheap containing all the data of a person and Kenyans will no longer need to carry documents such as national IDs, NHIF, and NSSF cards.

“What we have in our records must match what is in the database 100% for us to be sure that the person who presented him or herself before us is the person we shall admit as a Kenyan.”

“There are 90 fingerprints experts working on this, and so far about 14 million of the 37 million data sets have been cleaned up,” he added