Kenyan Living In UK Wants Fresh SIM Card Registration Declared Null And Void In A Court Petition

NAIROBI, Kenya, Apr 8- A Kenyan citizen living in the United Kingdom has moved to court, to challenge the ongoing fresh registration of SIM Cards, a few days before the April 15 deadline set by the Communications Authority of Kenya.

Eliud Karanja, who says is a champion and defender of the 2010 Constitution, has moved in court to challenge the legality of the exercise, which has seen growing outrage among Kenyans and human rights organizations.

The petitioner wants the court to declare sections 5b(5), 27 and 27D, of the Kenya Information and Communications Act, 1998 unconstitutional, and therefore, null and void.

He also wants the Kenya Information and Communications (Registration of Subscribers of Telecommunications Services), Regulations, 2014 – Legal Notice No. 10 of 2014, declared unconstitutional and, therefore, null and void.

Also on his list is the Kenya Information and Communications (Registration of Subscribers of Telecommunications Services), Regulations, 2015 – Legal Notice No. 163 of 2015.

Further, he wants the regulations 5(1)(g), 12 and 15(6), Kenya Information and Communications (Registration of Subscribers of Telecommunications Services), Regulations, 2015 – Legal Notice No. 163 of 2015, declared unconstitutional and, therefore, null and void.

He also wants the court to declare the ongoing fresh registration unconstitutional and therefore, null and void.

CA Director General Ezra Chiloba has warned that those who will not have registered afresh with their various service providers, will have their SIM cards deactivated.

He also said a person who will not have registered afresh the SIM cards by April 15 will face fines of up to Sh300,000 or serve a jail term of six months or both.

In the petition, Karanja has listed the following as respondents; the Communication Authority of Kenya, ICT Cabinet Secretary Joe Mucheru, the Data Protection Commissioner, the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights, National Gender and Equality Commission, Commission on Administrative Justice, and the Attorney General.

Others are Safaricom, Airtel Networks Kenya limited, and National Assembly, while Telkom Kenya is listed as an interested party.

While the petition was filed in court in March, there are no orders issued yet.

The case was mentioned on Thursday and while it has been served under a certificate of urgency, no orders have been issued to restrain the Communication Authority of Kenya or communication service providers from carrying on with the exercise.

The Kenya Human Rights Commission has termed the exercise a serious threat to privacy rights against intrusive data harvesting.

The lobby group says already a majority of Kenyans registered their SIM cards at the point of purchase.

“The government continues to wield pervasive power to invasively collect our personal data whereas we’ve witnessed previous data breaches that led to irregular sharing of our personal data with third parties e.g many Kenyans have been irregularly registered into political parties,” the lobby group said in a Twitter thread.

According to KHRC, the government has not done enough to ensure strong safeguards for data protection.

“Majority Kenyans registered their SIM cards at the point of purchase, yet now you’re to submit new personal data or risk de-registration/hefty fines,” said the lobby group.

“Without data protection safeguards in place, Kenyans are worried that their faces and personal data risk being shared with third parties. We should not normalize the forced collection of personal data. We need secure systems that guarantee the protection of citizens’ privacy rights.”