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E-Citizen's Premium Dreams, Ethiopia's Drone Factory
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Kenyan Wall Street
March 10, 2025
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What's Inside
Late last week, news broke that Webmasters Kenya, the company that runs the e-government platform E-Citizen is mulling adding premium services.
Under the controversial plan, citizens who pay the premium charges would get expedited services.
Users currently pay a flat convenience fee for using the platform, and that has been controversial enough by itself.
Part of the controversy around the current fee revolves around who processes the payments and how the fee was calculated in the first place.
Adding premium services to an e-government platform would likely defeat the foundational idea of such platforms, especially accessibility and fairness. While the current fee is controversial, it is a flat figure for everyone seeking the same services, which means that everyone gets the same service.
A premium tier would create an unequal experience for citizens seeking government services, which was another foundational idea for building e-government platforms. While there is perhaps a financial logic to the plan, the socioeconomic imbalance it would worsen makes it a bad idea from the onset.
It would definitely worsen government bureaucracy, but even worse is that it would unfairly affect service delivery to those who can’t afford it. It has been sold partially as a way of increasing government revenue and reducing the bureaucracies that sustain corruption, but there’s little proof so far that it would succeed in either.
Stay updated on this and other important news on The Kenyan Wall Street.
Money is like manure; it’s not worth a thing unless it’s spread around.
Ethiopia Now Has a Drone Factory
Ethiopia inaugurated both an ammunition factory and a drone factory in the same week, but according to PM Abiy Ahmed, the new military industry is ““not to fuel conflict, but to prevent it.”
Addis Ababa says the moves are just a deterrence, but it is engaged in multiple ongoing internal conflicts that make it hard to view it as just that.
It also has strained relations with its neighbours Eritrea and Somalia, and a lasting conflict with Egypt over its signature GERD dam on the River Nile.
In both cases, Addis Ababa is aiming not just for local manufacturing and sales, but also for exports.
“To sustain this progress, we must invest in continuous research, expand our market reach, and strengthen local production of smart sensor technologies,” he added.
It is still unclear whether the drone factory will manufacture most of the components from scratch or will work as an assembly plant for unmanned aerial vehicles. But local capability in drone manufacturing and assembly may give Ethiopia an upper hand in the multiple conflicts it is engaged in.
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Have a great week!