Tanzanian women married to Kenyans in Taita Taveta county have appealed to the government to issue them with Kenyan identification cards.
The more than 300 women out of about 1,300 county-wide said they are denied inheritance, loans and health services due to lack of national IDs.
They were speaking in Taveta town during a meeting with Taita Taveta Human Rights Watch lobby group.
The women, legally married to Kenyan men, said they are subjected to abject poverty due to lack of the important document.
Some of them have been living in the country for more than 30 years, and their children and grandchildren are Kenyan citizens by birth.
Rafa Salim, 46, a Tanzanian national who has been married to a Kenyan spouse for 21 years, said lack of IDs has marginalised them.
She said they have been unable to either get loans from financial institutions or inherit properties from their husbands.
“You have to bend very low to get loans in empowerment groups using your husband's ID card. Other groups and microfinance institutions do not accept a third-party identification card,” Rafa said.
She urged Interior CS Fred Matiang’i to order the issuing of Kenyan IDs to them, adding that they were also left out in the recent registration of Huduma Number.
The swelling number of foreigners has been attributed to the county’s proximity to neighbouring Tanzania and cross-border trade in the porous Taveta border.
The women, some of whom crossed through undesignated routes into Kenya to follow their hearts across the border, said they have been denied some crucial services, where IDs were required for access.
Shamila Yahya, who has lived in the country for 17 years, said most of the women do not have passports and Tanzanian IDs.
She said most women lack basic healthcare as they are unable to register to the National Hospital Insurance Fund and Linda Mama medical scheme.
Lillian Msheri, another woman who has faced the same problem, asked the East African Community integration to harmonise the process of acquiring IDs for citizens of the region.
She said if not addressed, the bureaucracy would make them immigrants in pursuit of love.
“We are here because of love, the only documents we have is marriage certificates and affidavits. Let the government formulate a way of assisting us,” she said.
Zedekiah Dika, a legal officer at Kituo Cha Sheria, said the state has violated the women’s rights by denying them IDs.
“The constitution is very clear on dual citizenship for foreign spouses. We shall compel the government to look into the matter,” Dika, also the Coast region civil society chairman, said.
He said the civil society will petition the government for violation of human rights.
