eCitizen payment mode will lock out many hustlers

Kenya has been at the cutting edge of digital tech. M-Pesa is a landmark tech that has proved a lever of so many other socioeconomic benefits we accrue from the digital platform.

Not many Kenyans had access to banking before the advent of M-Pesa. But M-Pesa has essentially solved that and most digital based payments can be made even by the unbanked.

Gone are the days when one had to have a credit or visa card to purchase goods and services, whether in another country or on an e-commerce site. The betting industry, for instance, has benefitted a great deal from M-Pesa, and so is the video on demand and, to a large extent, the monetisation of content by different content producers.

However, most of the goods and services on the digital space that benefit from technology are essentially wants. Basic needs and services, including government services, should not be restricted to electronic modes of payment in a country characterised by a glaring digital divide. Internet and smartphone penetration in Kenya may be among the highest in Africa, but we still have many Kenyans who will be locked out if we restrict payment of services Citizen.

The rationale behind eCitizen as the only payment system for government services may be noble from the point of efficient revenue collection. But from the service provision perspective, it does not favour many citizens seeking government services.

In public hospitals, patients endure the long wait beyond the normal long queues because payments to eCitizen take long to reflect.

It is the same drama in government agencies, especially the ones offering services like verification of documents. This wait is unnecessary and has bred a new form of petty corruption where cashiers and revenue officers ask service seekers to pay in cash in lieu of their payments that reflect sometimes after many hours.

If the intention was to curb corruption, it seems like a monumental failure because a service seeker suffers twice. First, from corrupt officers taking advantage of people who, because of eCitizen delays, are forced to pay cash to be cleared and second, at the top where the eCitizen system is perceived to be consolidating revenues for ease of large-scale looting.

There is also, the management of the backend of the platform which is shrouded in mystery, yet this is a public platform and access to how it works and is managed should be made transparent.

Who is on charge of what? What’s the turnaround time after payment and when the platform is down what happens and how does service provision continue seamlessly?

Convenience fee has elicited a lot of questions. Is it the government that takes the fee or the provider of the backend system? Who is this provider and why would citizens who are already paying taxes pay convenience fee for services that a government they are funding provides?

The convenience fee for the Electronic Travel Authorisation, for instance, is slightly more than $4 and with an average of two million visitors yearly that is $9 million.

Almost all other services have a convenience fee of about Sh50. Linda Jamii is in court contesting the convenience fee.

Many Kenyans are wondering why they should pay for a convenience fee for access to services via the digital platform in a country where majority pay an arm and leg of what they have, to access a smart phone or the Internet through third parties.

It is like we are back to the Nyayo era when chiefs were lords unto themselves and folks would have to part with money and goats to access them and get those signatures that were needed for government services. Only that this time, the hurdle is many fold as first, folks will need to pay to access technology like the internet, then pay through Citizen.

And because it takes forever for confirmation, pay cashiers again and suffer the cost of convenience fee for all the inconvenience this new policy has occasioned.

It is about time someone explained why this drive to eCitizen payment and how it addresses the plight of the folks at the bottom of the pyramid.

—The writer is a PhD candidate in political communication