A 19-year-old student has accused the government of using her idea in the registration of Huduma Namba without her permission.
Speaking to Citizen TV on Saturday, the student, Mercy Kimani claimed the technology used in the registration of Huduma Namba was extremely similar to that which she together with her friend Lorraine Ouma presented at a science exhibition on July 2018 at KICC.
The two who studied their secondary education at Naivasha girls came up with the project dubbed Mwananchi card while in form three.
"I had researched on the social security card and thought that it will be such a nice idea since in our country we did not have such which existed," Mercy narrated.
The teenage student demonstrated how the 'Mwananchi' card helps in identifying details of a citizen including ID number and bank account when swiped through a device.
According to Mercy, she did not believe the similarity of her project and that of Huduma Namba was a mere coincidence.
"When I went into the site, the NIIMS site I looked through their pdf and apparently the Huduma Namba had so many similarities which I wouldn't consider coincidental with the project I had," she told Citizen TV.
The Cabinet Secretary in the Ministry of Information and Communications Joe Mucheru, however, insisted that youths should do enough research to find out whether their ideas are already in existence or not, to avoid being disappointed.