What Kenya needs to do to get it right on Huduma Namba
Published: 24/Oct/2021
Source: The Star (Nairobi)
By Catherine Muya
The High Court on October 14 ordered that the government conducts a data protection impact assessment before rolling out the Huduma cards as required by the Data Protection Act.
In finding that the Data Protection Act applied retrospectively to all the data that had been collected in the Huduma Namba exercise, Justice Jairus Ngaah said the government “had not fully appreciated the import and the extent of the application of the Data Protection Act, with respect to collection and processing of data collected under the National Integrated Identity Management System.”
This adds to the long line of litigation that has engulfed the Huduma Namba rollout since amendments were made to introduce NIIMS in 2018.
Through the Huduma Namba, the government aims to create and manage a database for all Kenyan citizens and foreign nationals residing in Kenya that will be the single source of the truth on a person’s identity.
Indeed, Kenyans are tired of unnecessary duplication of identity registration, providing different data points to multiple government agencies. In addition to identity, Huduma Namba also aims to provide critical data for planning and decision-making to realise Kenya’s development agenda. Governments across Africa are digitising identity to do this.
Read further: https://www.the-star.co.ke/siasa/2021-10-24-what-kenya-needs-to-do-to-get-it-right-on-huduma-namba/