Author: Francis Muli

Political elites who served during the last 10 years of late retired President Daniel Moi and Mwai Kibaki’s reigns stole at least Ksh327 billion and hid it in off-shore accounts, a new study has shown. The amounts were either paid directly to them or received as kickbacks from state corporations, according to the report titled “Elite Capture of Foreign Aid: Evidence from Offshore Bank Accounts”. The study was conducted by Bob Rijkers of the World Bank, Jorgen Juel Andersen of BI Norwegian Business School, and Niels Johannesen of the University of Copenhagen and covered the period between 1990 and 2010.…

StarTimes Media has announced a revamped bouquet offering that will see the introduction of eight new premium channels across news, kids, movies, fashion, novelas, gaming and esports. The new channels will be available for subscribers at the same monthly subscription for their bouquets of choice. The channels, Sky News, CBeebies, Film Box, Gametoon, Timeless Drama Channel (TDC), Tlnovelas, FashionBox HD and Toonami will enrich the already existing content genres available to the broadcaster’s terrestrial and satellite television subscribers. Sky News is one of the major international news channels that delivers 24-hour latest global developments covering a wide range of topics such as finance, politics, technology,…

The government has announced that it is reviewing the Legal Metrology Act (formerly Weights and Measures Act) to include more measures under the watch of the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS). Among the measures that will be placed under KEBS if the amendment of the Act sails through include electricity meters, taximeters, airtime meters, measurements used in health, public safety and environmental protection. “My Ministry is reviewing the Act, now renamed as Legal Metrology Act to accommodate the above. It is still in the process of enactment,” said Industrialization CS Betty Maina. Ms Maina spoke during the celebration of the…

Since the Corona virus global pandemic was first confirmed in Kenya, over 15 million primary, secondary and university students have been sent home. Several institutions have bee struggling to sustain online learning, especially at the tertiary level with companies such as Huawei coming to their aid with technological support. For instance Huawei ICT Academy Kenya have collaborated with its partners for higher learning under the Learn ON program to help transition from face-to-face learning to online learning. A webinar with academic partners was held to discuss how learning institutions can join the program. “Severe short-term disruption has been felt by…

TikTok ratings have gone down to 1.3 stars from 4.5 just a few days ago. The platform has been trending on social media for the better part of the day with the hashtag #tiktokexposed. The short-video sharing platform owned by ByteDance is facing a huge backlash in India after an altercation between its influencers and Youtube Content creators. The onslaught came after Youtube celebrity Carry Minati roasted a Tiktok star in a video that has since been taken down on account of cyber bulling. The video had 70 million views and Minati’s fans went on twitter to wage a war…

Health CS Mutahi Kagwe has said that the government is yet to establish whether Moses Wetangula’s brother Tony Waswa died of Covid-19. Addressing journalists during the daily Covid-19 briefings, Kagwe said that he could not ascertain until contact tracing was done, highly suggesting that Waswa could have died of Covid-19. “We cannot respond to that question until we have done the contact tracing [to establish whether Waswa’s contact persons were exposed to coronavirus or not], and indeed certified that what you are saying [that Tony Waswa died of coronavirus] is correct,” said CS Kagwe. Waswa was buried today in his…

The World Bank will lend the Kenyan Government $1 billion (Ksh106 billio) to support its budget. According to Treasury Secretary Ukur Yatani, this is the biggest financing package ever from the World Bank to Kenya. “The fact that the World Bank does not provide budget support to countries with weak macro framework is a testimony of the confidence levels of the bank in our new policy reforms,” Yatani tweeted. The World Bank’s country representative, Carlos Felipe Jaramilo told reporters in Nairobi that of the $1 billion, $750 million credit will come from the International Development Association at an interest rate…

Microsoft today launched the Power African Community for African developers. The concept is similar to their earlier program dubbed NexTech Africa where like minds would converge and engage with tech experts from various parts of the world. “We will bring back the concept of Nextech but ongoing. This year we want to engage with you (African Developers) so much better through a series of virtual events. Events focused on Power Platform, Azure, M365 and much more.” said Dona Sakar, Microsoft’s principal advocate. The Power Africa Tech will comprise a small group of African tech developers. They will be able to…

Facebook has announced the launch of Shops, a feature that allows businesses to set up free storefronts on both Facebook and Instagram. The shops will be powered by third party affiliates; Shopify, Big Commerce and Woo with the aim of turning the social media apps into a top tier shopping destination for users. Mark Zuckerberg announced this in a livestream and indicated that expanding e-commerce was one way of rebuilding the economy during the Coronavirus pandemic. “If you can’t physically open your store or restaurant, you can still take orders online and ship them to people,” he said. “We’re seeing…

The National Treasury has allocated the Nairobi Metropolitan Service (NMS) Ksh26.4 billion for its operations and stimulation of the economy which has been affected by adverse effects of Covid-19 pandemic. This comes as a relief to the agency formed recently to manage functions transferred to the National Government from Nairobi County, but has been denied the much needed cash by Nairobi governor Mike Sonko. In April, governor Sonko refused to sign a bill allocating NMS Ksh15 billion for operations. According to Sonko, the Nairobi County Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2020 contravened provisions of the law and should be revised by the…

2019 marked a major milestone for the mobile money industry in the world with over a billion registered accounts and about $ 2 billion in daily transactions globally. This is according to the annual GSMA (Global System for Mobile Communications) report: State of the Industry report on Mobile Money. The report showed that there was increased user trust and relevance with 57 percent of mobile money transactions being digital transactions. There are currently 290 live mobile money services in 95 countries with 372 million active user accounts. For consumers, this has marked a shift from tradition cash transactions with more…

Instagram is rolling out a new guides feature to allow creators curate content together in one location. This is in line with the social media app’s aim to help individuals find useful content and inspiration from your preferred accounts. The initial guides will focus on content that is wellness based to help people cope with the effects of the Coronavirus pandemic. For now, users will find tips on maintaining connections with loved ones, caring for your wellbeing and managing grief and anxiety. The guides update will enable non-profits, publishers and other organizations create content that is article like combining videos,…

Google may be late to the party but they have finally rolled out a dark mode option for their search app. The option will be coming to more phones during the week, some earlier than others. The light-on-dark-on feature has been a part of the google beta version for a few months now, but it’s now being released widely. Users whose devices run on android 10 and iOS13 will not need to take any action to enable the dark mode option. When the update comes, the app will detect your device’s display settings and follow suit. iOS12 users may be…

Huawei has protested US’ move to put them on the Entity List last year, that bars them from trading with Us companies. US companies who wish to export products and software to entities on the list must apply for a licence from the Bureau of Industry and Security, an agency under the US Department of Commerce, although the licence review policy is usually a “presumption of denial” – meaning that license applications are unlikely to be granted. In a statement, Huawei says that the move which was made on May 16, 2019, was made without justification, and despite complying with…

Barely a week after the World Trade Organisation (WTO) CEO Roberto Azevêdo announced that he would be stepping down in September, Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Sports Amina Mohamed has announced interest in the post. Azevedo, a 62-year-old Brazilian, announced to WTO delegates on Thursday that he would resign one year to expiry of his term, saying that it was the best time for him and his family. “It’s the best thing for me, my family and the organization. We are doing nothing now – no negotiations, everything is stuck. There’s nothing happening in terms of regular work,” he said in…