Co-operative Insurance Company (CIC), Kenya’s only microinsurance company, will pay claims resulting from the country’s recent political unrest over a disputed presidential election. As of the end of January, CIC had already received claims totaling KES 55 million, equivalent to USD 779,037, an amount that is expected to rise as over 90 percent of CIC’s insured clients have yet to file claims. CIC’s decision to honor claims is a precedent in a country where insurers do not usually offer protection against loss or damage due to political risk.
Mr. Nelson Kuria, managing director of CIC, said that the decision arose from the nature of CIC’s “…cooperative insurance with a social consideration, different from commercial insurance companies”. This decision is also seen as a major effort in boosting public confidence and promoting the importance of an insurance policy as protection against unforeseen circumstances.
Thus far, most of the claims that have already been filed are from small businesses that were looted or burned during the political violence that have affected parts of the Rift Valley, Nyanza, Western Coast and Nairobi provinces . A major challenge for CIC will be to distinguish insured clients who are truly affected by the unrest from those merely seeking profit. CIC is actively dispatching staff to the affected areas to assess claims.
CIC is a private insurance company, originally established in 1978 as Co-operative Insurance Services Limited (CIS). In Kenya, it is the market leader in Group Life business and its only microinsurance financier. Its products include: death and permanent disability, personal accident, in-patient medical expenses, funeral expenses, livestock insurance, fire and burglary. As of December 2007, CIC has insured over 163,000 individual members with a portfolio of KES 17.8 billion (USD 252.1 million). CIC does not currently report to MIX Market, the microfinance information clearinghouse, nor to a third-party performance evaluator.
By Mary Fu
Additional Resources:
Bloomberg: Currency Calculator
Business Daily: “CIC to honor poll related claims”
Co-operative Insurance Company (CIC): About Us
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