Sh11m biometric system to weed out ghost workers

Nairobi county on Wednesday began to capture the biometric data of its 12,000 staff. 

The administration wants to weed out lazy and ghost workers. 

Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko led his cabinet in launching the exercise after City Hall implemented the Sh11 million biometric registration system.

The administration previously reported that at least 3,000 people impersonated county staff officers to mislead the public.

The registration process will continue until June 15.

“This exercise will help us reduce the number (of ghost workers) and we’ll only remain with the genuine and identified staff,” Sonko said.

“We have been losing millions to these ghost workers that have somehow managed to infiltrate all government sectors. But once we identify them we will be presenting them to the DCI and DPP to face the law,” he added.

An added security feature of the registration exercise will be the allocation of a unique number to each county officer.

The public will send the unique identifier number to an SMS code to verify whether one is a genuine officer at City Hall, according to Starlite Limited, the biometric system provider. 

A security clearance feature will be installed on doors and staff will use their fingerprint or a card to enter. This will enable officials to identify them, when they report to work and when they leave. 

Patrick Kariuki, a systems operator at Starlite, said the verification SMS code would be announced to the public once all the staff had completed the registration process.

“We can only announce the verification code once we have registered and captured the bio-data of all the county workers to ensure that the service is efficient,” he said.

Kariuki said if a member of the public sends a message and finds that the person is an impostor, he will be given an option of contacting the police. 

(Edited by O. Owino)