Maarifa Centres Offer Access to e-Government Services

Jacob Muinde Musyoka is a divisional agricultural extension officer- Tseikuru district. He learnt about kyuso Maarifa when he was working with the ministry of agriculture – Kyuso. Mr. Muinde is one of the beneficiaries of the Maarifa centre. First he started by taking the free ICT training offered by the Maarifa centre. Secondly, when he was transferred to Tseikuru District he realized that there was less Cyber cafe due to weak Internet connectivity in the area.

In late 2011, the government of Kenya introduced Government human resource information system (GHRIS) Portal whose aim is to address all its Human Resource (HR) needs , where the civil servants could updates their profile, download payslips, check leave day balance among other government services. Users of GHRIS are Government MDAs, Employees, and the Public who will benefit from a centralized readily accessible, efficient and transparent system. According to Mr. Muinde they are charged a processing fee of Kshs 800 per payslip in Tseikuru and due to demand of the document civil servants have no option.

Mr. Muinde has been visiting the Maarifa centre every month to access his and his wife payslip. He says that he has been able to secure banks loans easily because the banks will require the last three (3) payslip. “The Maarifa centre has enabled me save a large sum of money” said Mr. Muinde. I don’t incur a lot of cost coming to the Maarifa since I just need to fuel the government motorbike with less than Ksh 300. Secondly my wife stays in Kyuso so I don’t incur accommodation cost.

Due large number of civil servants willing to be helped the Field officer is encouraging them to join ICT training at the centre. Secondly, since this will be a continuous process the Field officer is in a process of coming up with HOW TO manual on the same.

Website: https://www.ghris.go.ke/