Piece by: AJUMA MILLICENT

05 February 2024

• The move to shift the payment of school fees by students in national schools to e-citizen will eliminate corruption that comes through cash payments.

Former Kenyan National Union of Teachers Secretary General Wilson Sossion has defended the government's move on school fees being shifted to e-Citizen.

According to Sossion, the move to shift the payment of school fees by students in national schools to e-citizen will eliminate corruption that comes through cash payments.

In an interview on Monday, the legislator said that the e-citizen platform has been implemented to facilitate transparency.

"E-citizen is a general policy that the government has adopted in its accounting system, to eliminate all forms of corruption and avoid transactions using cash payments," he said on Citizen TV.

Sossion also said that using the platform will eliminate the indirect charges levied on parents by schools, that are not within the fee structures.

These indirect charges, he says, include the school uniforms where parents have been exploited to pay exorbitant fees.

According to Sossion, the indirect charges are becoming a barrier to access to education.

He explained that the reason there is pushback in the implementation is because the move has not been fully explained.

Sossion also said that the e-citizen platform has boosted the revenue collection in other areas citing KWS.

"There were issues in KWS about shifting to e-citizen but eventually it is working well and the revenue collection has gone up," the legislator said.

Sossion said the process to use the platform is easy and effective and there is a need for Kenyans to embrace the system.

He believes that the system will be more convenient for students and parents.

"As an experienced educator, I believe, we should be able to protect students to ensure that they are able to attend school without barriers from issues like indirect charges," he said.

On January 31, 2024, Basic Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang sent a circular to all national school principals, directing them to submit the institution's bank account information to speed up the onboarding procedure.