The government has vowed to intensify the crackdown on passport brokers at Nyayo House to other regional immigration offices in the country.
Speaking in Mombasa during a meeting on the National Assembly Committee on Delegated Legislation Immigration and Citizen Services, Principal Secretary (PS) Julius Bitok said that the exercise will be duplicated in Kisumu, Mombasa, and Kisii.
“The crackdown that is around Nyayo house will be extended to other cities and towns like Mombasa, Kisumu, Kisii, and many other places where there are complaints from Kenyans that are not able to get services because they’re people who are suspected to be abetting corruption.”
Further, Bitok said that the government was determined to rid Nyayo House of conmen and middlemen who are suspected of working with Immigration officers to extort bribes from applicants seeking passports and other services.
“Besides Immigration Services, Nyayo House hosts many other government offices… I want to assure Kenyans that we are going to make Nyayo House a place where you can expect to be served diligently without having to know anyone or parting with bribes.”
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On Friday, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) detectives arrested four men inside Nyayo House over suspected soliciting of bribes.
The suspects’ phones were confiscated as the officers sought evidence to support prosecution for defrauding unsuspecting applicants.
Further, PS Bitok said the backlog on the processing passports will be cleared in two weeks.
“Right now, we are producing around 3600 passports per day. We have managed to reduce the backlog that was around 100,000 passports to around 45,000. We are projecting that in the next two weeks, there will be no backlog.”
He added that with the arrival of new printers and the implementation of the proposed private-public-partnership, the waiting period for passports will be cut down to within a week and eventually lead to express services.
