Govt to digitize Mwananchi Gas sale process

The government is set to digitize the procurement process for the low cost gas project as it seeks to weed out unintended beneficiaries that saw the project stall last year.

The digitization of the Mwananchi Gas will see the government use National Social Security Fund (NSSF), National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) and Registrar of Persons data to authenticate beneficiaries.

Petroleum principal secretary Andrew Kamau said the project is targeted at low income households by subsidizing the cost gas cylinders, hence the need to ensure it reaches the intended beneficiaries.

“It didn’t quite work out the way we wanted it. In some areas people who could afford to buy the cylinders at the normal price became beneficiaries so we need to go back to the drawing board and go from the manual system to another digital system,” Mr Kamau said in an interview.

The project being implemented by National Oil Corporation targets 4.3 million households that will purchase the cylinders at Sh2,000 down from Sh5,000.

Mr Kamau said the project will be re launched in April.

“From next month is when we start rolling it again, of course we needed to procure the digital platform and that’s being done,” he said.

The PS said the Mwananchi Gas project will kick off with 400,000 cylinders in the first phase before being up scaled to five million as demand grow.

The project is being implemented as a cost-effective and eco friendly source of fuel that would help reduce deforestation once full embraced.

National Oil plans to set up a mini plant and distribution centers across all the 47 counties to ease the access to the cylinders.