Author: Francis Muli

10 percent of Kenyans are unable to service their loans at all while another 13.6 percent are falling significantly behind in their payment obligations. This is according to a new survey by financial recovery firm Collect Pro, which discovered that half of Kenyan households have struggled to keep up with their loan payments due to the negative effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. Dubbed the Indebtedness Survey, the report reveals that quarter of the respondents (24.9 percent) are slightly behind in their loan servicing obligations. A third (37.5%) have already taken advantage of the moratorium on repayments to ease their repayment burden.…

Standard Chartered bank has been trending on social media for the last two days after a user posted a story about a 70 year old woman who had lost her entire pension amounting to Sh1.3 million in the bank. “My mum who is 70 years, and whose account is account 0100319393600 (Harambee Avenue branch) found her account emptied of her pension funds of Kes. 1,370,000 on 4th September, 2020, through suspected internal collusion. Whenever she has tried to contact Stanchart, they refuse to talk to her. Keep note that this is a 70 year old who retired over 15 year…

A European Union Development fund is financing Biometric identity systems in Senegal and Ivory Coast with an additional goal of helping them identify illegal immigrants in Europe. According to a report by Privacy International, the system will help identify undocumented citizens and organize their return. One document goes farther to say that the system in Ivory Coast in part aims to “facilitate the identification of people genuinely of Ivorian nationality and to organize their return more easily.” Read: EU Snubs Amina Mohamed For WTO Job, Opts To Support Korean, Nigerian Candidates Biometric Identity Systems gathers the names, dates of birth…

Standard Chartered Bank Kenya has announced plans to lay off 200 employees in a restructuring move. According to a brief sent to the Banking Insurance & Finance Union, the targeted staffers are those in the management level and the unionisable staff. The bank attributes the retrenchment to a digital transformation strategy that started in 2016 that will make certain roles redundant. “In the circumstance, the bank intends to declare redundant the employees whose roles fall off as a result of the restructuring. The impacted employees who are both in management and unionisable cadre are 200 in the retail banking, corporate…

Bus hailing app, Swvl is rolling out its long distance service in the country. The new service will see commuters who wish to travel outside the city, use the platform to book rides and get services. Through the platform, customers can travel to a total of twelve upcountry destinations including Naivasha, Nakuru, Molo, Eldoret, Narok, Bomet, Kericho, Kisii, Kisumu, Nyeri, Nanyuki and Machakos. Swvl aims to bridge the gap in the travel sector by providing frictionless, hussle free, app-enabled travel. The Egyptian firm plans to partner with existing Matatu saccos and shuttle services to roll out long distance services. Read:…

Diageo, the company that owns the Guiness alcohol brand has recalled newly-launched alcohol-free Guiness 0.0 over contamination. In a statement on Wednesday, Diageo said the brand had been recalled in England, Scotland and Wales “because of a microbiological contamination”. Guinness 0.0 was launched last month as a low-calorie and alcohol-free drink, retailing in four packs of 440ml cans as of October 26. The recall was made as a “precautionary measure”, since the contamination “may make some cans of Guinness 0.0 unsafe to consume”. “We are sorry that this has happened,” the company said. British Guinness announced that production of the…

In its “One More thing” event on Tuesday, Apple unveiled its latest Macs with the new M1 processor. The company had earlier announced that it is moving away from its custom intel processors. The M1 processor is now used to power the new MacBook Air, MacBook Pro and MacMini models. The M1 chip is similar to the iPhone 12 and iPad Air most recent processor, with four cores each on high performance and high efficiency. The company says that these two factors will balance out longevity and power. In the Macbook Air, the M1 processor will help optimize battery life…

Started in October last year and the completion date supposed to be April 2021, Chengoni Bridge in Kilifi South was supposed to be a saviour to the residents of Kaloleni and Mwaarakaya. However, for now there is only wood and few pieces of timber laid across the river, and there is no activity ongoing four months to the completion date. The bridge is supposed to cost Ksh55 million funded by the government through the Equalisation Fund. On Monday, November 9, a team from the Special Funds Accounts committee visited the site only to find a ghosted site, where only Ksh5.5…

Sony is planning to start building its own brand of Drones called “Airpeak”. The electronics company says it has been inspired to enter the market given the rapid adaptation of drones in day to day life. “Sony has assigned the “Airpeak” brand to reflect its aspiration to contribute to the further evolvement and the creation of the unprecedented value through its imaging and sensing technology as well as 3R technologies (Reality, Real-time and Remote) in the drone area,” the company says. Sony is specifically getting into the market to develop drones to be used in video creation. Their main target…

Measuring about 100 acres in Muthaiga, land parcel LR No.12422/9 belonged to former cabinet minister the late Arthur Kinyanjui Magugu, but now has been subdivided and sold to different people. According to an investigation by the National Land Commission (NLC), directors of Karura Investments Limited (KIL) colluded with a surveyor to change the details of ownership that saw the land subdivided and transferred to the company. NLC found that the land was sub-divided into two parcels, LR No 12422/203 and LR No. 12422/204, both registered in the name of Magugu. Later, LR No. 12422/204 was sub-divided into two portions, LR…

The government has already transferred Ksh5 billion to the National Land Commission (NLC) for the acquisition of Nairobi’s Railways Club. The land will be used for the expansion of Uhuru Highway to give way for construction of Nairobi Expressway from the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) to Rironi. “The Treasury has confirmed that the money is available and that the NLC is finalising the valuation for the compulsory acquisition of Railways Club land,” said Nairobi Senator Johnson Sakaja. The land will also be used to construct a passenger terminal for matatus coming through Machakos and Lang’ata roads. In a Gazette…

Project Taara have announced that they are partnering with Econet  and Liquid Telecom to bring High Speed Internet to Sub-Saharan Africa, starting with Kenya. Like Project Loon, Project Taara is also under Google’s parent company, Alphabet. Through a blog post, Project Taara General Manager, Mahesh Krishnaswamy announced the partnership, saying that internet connectivity was essential for economic growth as had been witnessed during the Covid-19 pandemic. “Meaningful connectivity is essential for economic growth and to fast track access to opportunity, yet almost 4 billion people around the world remain unconnected. Meanwhile, many more people still can’t afford a connection that…

Today’s Covid-19 update shows that 1,344 tested positive for the virus from a sample size of 7,162 people tested in the last 24 hours. This brings the number of confirmed cases in the country to a total of 64,588.The cumulative number of tests are now at 753,959. Out of the confirmed cases today, 1,299 are Kenyans and 45 are foreigners. Nairobi leads with 322 cases, followed by Kiambu with 221 and Mombasa with 133 confirmed. 436 patients have recovered, 297 cases from home based care and 139 from various hospitals. The total number of recoveries now stands at 43,095. Read:…

Many people work from their laptops and rarely notice how much dirt their devices accumulate. Research shows that laptops can carry 20,000 more germs compared to your toilet seat. A dirty laptop looks old and in some cases, may be slowed down by the filth. Cleaning your laptop screen is quite easy and can be done daily. However, your keyboard can easily collect dirt and dust which could affect its operation in the long term. Your laptop does not need to get visibly dirty for you to take action. Make it a habit to clean it up and it could…

Struggling retailer Tuskys has called for a meeting with all its creditors even as it seeks to stay afloat amid liquidation threats from creditors. in a public notice, Tuskys said that the meeting will be held online on Wednesday, November 11, at 2pm in a bid to agree on a debt settlement plan for all category of creditors. “Tuskys has experienced business disruption over the last six months compounded by the COVID-19 crisis.  In order to return business to normalcy, Tuskys has developed a business recovery and global debt settlement plan for all category of creditors. The company is now…