The French Technology firm IDEMIA Securities, has been blocked from doing business in the country for at least 10 years.
Who is the tenderpreneur behind this company? Anyone know how much they’ve made in this country?
Some facts:
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Parliament has no powers to “block” or ban any company from doing business in the country. Contrary to widespread and misleading media reports, the Parliament motion was just that, a Motion. It was no ‘ban’.
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I am not sure, but doubt there is a tenderpreneur behind the company. Idemia is a 13,000 staff global company that is headquartered io France. Its biggest shareholder is a Venture Capital company that is based in the United States. Idemia provides technologies for citizen registrations and elections to countries around the world. They may have had a ‘Godfather’ but its shareholding is public.
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I do not know how much they have made in the country.
Another myth that is being propagated is that of Huduma card. There are two card-based Huduma projects in Kenya. One is a Huduma Card project, in which members are issued with a card that is linked to Mastercard, for, say, welfare payments and the like. Idemia has nothing to do with this Huduma card.
Then there is a next generation national ID card dubbed Huduma number. Idemia is involved here as it provided government with kits qith which to capture citizen details, viz biometrics, photo, bio data.
Somehow, both Hudumas have been erroneously linked to Idemia. The government was wrong to create brand confusion by having multiple card related projects named Huduma.
The idea may have been Noble but their communication approach was ineffective
This…!