Nubian Rights Forum & 2 others v Attorney General & 6 others; Child Welfare Society & 9 others (Interested Parties) [2020] eKLR and principles to be observed in gathering the said information including where, when and how the said information may be gathered and by whom. He further contended that in essence, the provision permits the State to require all manner of private information, including DNA, from citizens without their consent. 160. Mr. Kegoro averred, on the basis of advice from various experts and his own knowledge obtained from various research papers on the subject, that DNA information can be used for a variety of purposes which makes it susceptible to abuse and exposes citizens to negative profiling. It was his view that such negative profiling would have serious implications for civil liberties and could allow the State or unintended third parties to compile files containing highly personal data such as a person's racial origins, medical history or psychological profile. He averred that such information can be abused by the State to suppress civil liberties or by business enterprises to advance commercial interests without the subject persons’ consent. 161. It was his further averment that the impugned amendments also purport to confer functions ordinarily performed by a legal person, usually a legal officer or corporation, on a system. In his view, this essentially renders the system supreme and unquestionable and thereby yields control of sensitive personal information to the inventor or author of the system. 162. With respect to section 9A (2)(b) which provides for the assignment of a unique national identification number to every registered person, Mr. Kegoro averred that the 2nd Petitioner was not, in principle, opposed to the assignment of such a number to citizens. He averred, however, that unless the concerns regarding the security and integrity of the system were addressed, a unique identification number as a central access platform will exacerbate the risk of compromise of the system and, by extension, the privacy and security of the people. 163. It was his averment further that persons locked out from registration for any reason risked being left out permanently without access to vital government services necessary for the fulfilment and enjoyment of fundamental rights. This, in his view, would be inconsistent with Articles 12(2) and 24 of the Constitution. He also contended that the impugned Act does not provide for transitional mechanisms from the current registration regime. There was no indication, for instance, as to when the unique identification number will be issued in the current roll out phase. In his view, this lacuna exposes citizens to unfair inconveniences that may be occasioned by whimsical administrative orders or directives for the implementation of the system. 164. The 2nd Petitioner also challenged the provisions of section 9A (2)(c) of the impugned Act. This provision requires the harmonisation, incorporation and collation into the register of all information from other databases in government agencies relating to registration of persons. Mr. Kegoro averred that such harmonisation entails information sharing amongst different agencies, which exposes the system to greater risks of intrusion and abuse. He averred that the amendments do not specify the interoperability modalities of the system. This was so, in his view, particularly in light of the fact that there currently exists a parallel Integrated Population Registration System (IPRS) under the Kenya Citizens and Foreign National Management Service Act No. 12 of 2012 which essentially duplicates the functions of NIIMS. According to Mr. Kegoro, the harmonisation process is prone to breaches as it is currently not clear which institution or person under the impugned Act and the Kenya Citizens and Foreign National Management Service Act will be accountable for the registration process. 165. Mr. Kegoro averred that the breaches in the harmonisation process could include destruction, deletion or loss of vital records, identity theft and fraud, malicious use of the information, wrongful entries, mismatch of information and hacks through cybercrimes. In his view, there would be no prejudice occasioned to any party if all these duplications and mismatches are harmonised in law before the system is operationalised. 166. The 2nd Petitioner further impugns the provisions of section 9A (2)(f) which relates to the verification and authentication of information relating to the registration and identification of persons. Mr. Kegoro averred that NIIMS is only capable of verifying and authenticating documents issued by itself. He contended that the http://www.kenyalaw.org - Page 25/174