The number of Kenyans who have registered for Huduma Namba has risen from 35 million to 38 million with the number expected to hit 40 million plus by closure of business on Saturday.
The ICT Cabinet Secretary (CS), Joe Mucheru has attributed the rise to the Presidential directive that extended the exercise by one week, saying the gesture had borne much fruit.
And with the exercise set to end , the government has ruled out extending the registration and advised Kenyans to take advantage of the remaining hours.
Last week, President Uhuru Kenyatta extended the exercise by another week to allow more Kenyans to register.
Mucheru said his ministry deployed more than 400 ICT experts to help the registration clerks in managing the digital equipment, adding that Kenyans had no excuse not to register.
He defended the registration exercise saying that once the National Integrated Information Management System (NIIMS) was operational, it would ease the cost and time of doing business for Kenyans.
“The digitalized information system will reduce the burden of carrying many documents required to perform different business with or access s ervices from the government,” he said.
The CS was speaking when the Ministry senior officials met with the Parliamentary select committee on ICT at Great Rift Valley Lodge in Naivasha to discuss on the Ministry Supplementary and Main Budgets requests.
Mucheru said the meeting with the parliamentary committee was meant to update them on the ministry’s performance on the ongoing and upcoming ICT projects in the country and find the best way to fund the projects for the benefit of all Kenyans.
The Chairman of the Committee, William Kisang noted that the country was losing over Sh.50 billion every year through cybercrime and challenged the ICT ministry to address this by ensuring that the operations of all other ministries and government agencies were digitalized.
He cited Kenya Revenue Authority which he said was losing a lot in terms of uncollected revenue and said there was need to fund the ICT ministry to help them digitize their services.
By Esther Mwangi/Hannah Wangui
