Financial Exclusion, Lack of Identity Documents: The Nightmare of Kenyan Refugees

Many urban refugees in Nairobi rely on proxies to be able to access any semblance of a financial service, and most are completely cut off from the conventional banking services…To get a bank account from most banks in Kenya, refugees are required to have a PIN Certificate from the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), a Refugee Card, and sometimes a recognition letter from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) or even a work permit, all of which they cannot immediately access…This essentially means that as a registered asylum seeker in Kenya, there is no way you can open a bank account to enable you transfer assets or receive money from abroad…According to [Teddy Kinyoro, a senior programmes manager at GiveDirectly in Nairobi], the problem is rooted in the difficulty accessing the required documentation, especially the alien ID card, which mainly stems from administrative challenges due to the huge backlog of asylum seekers in the country at any given time. (The EastAfrican)