Author: Francis Muli

Kenya Power Board held a crisis meeting on Sunday evening in a bid to fill positions of managers who have been arrested over Ksh4.5 billion scam. Among those arrested include the company’s former MD Ben Chumo, general manager for regional coordination Peter Mwicigi and legal secretary Beatrice Meso. Managing director Ken Tarus surrendered to the police on Sunday. Others who have been arrested include former general managers, John Ombui (Supply Chain) and Peter Mungai Kinuthia (Business Strategy). Others who are yet to be arrested are general managers Joshua Mutua (Commercial Services), Samuel Ndirangu (Information Communications Technology), Abubakar Swaleh (Human Resource…

Tanzania President John Pombe Magufuli has said that inmates should be forced to work day and night, and the lazy ‘kicked hard’. Speaking during the unveiling ceremony of Tanzania’s new Commissioner General of Prison Services Ms Phaustine Kasike, President Magufuli said that convicts should not be left to lazy around instead they should cultivate their own food. “Some prison staff don’t have homes. Make the prisoners work, let them make bricks day and night. If they show laziness, kick them. You have labourers, and for free. It is a shame for the country to continue to feed prisoners. All the…

Deputy President William Ruto has said that the government has set aside Ksh3 billion to rebuild the Gikomba market that burnt down in June. Ruto was speaking on Sunday at the AIPCA Kayole Church, where he promised that the fires at Gikomba Market would now be a thing of the past. “We have to stop these incidences of fires ever year, that is the reason we are investing Sh3 billion,” said Ruto. Read: Gikomba Fire Claims 15 Lives And Injures 70  At least 15 people died in Gikomba fire which broke out late last month, while more than  70 sustained…

Investigations have revealed that there are more than 4,954 Chinese nationals working for the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) project against 1600 Kenyans working for the project. This is against the initial agreement where the ration of Chinese to Kenyans working on the project was supposed to be 1:3. An investigative piece by the Sunday Standard shows that there are more than more than 1,100 civil engineers, about 200 bridge engineers, 150 Railway engineers, over 120 translators, about 100 accountants, at least 90 architectural engineers, over 85 electrical and mechanical engineers, more than 80 electricians, about 50 Chinese cooks, over 30 administration…

Seven of the 14 black rhinos that were moved from Nairobi and Lake Nakuru national parks two weeks ago have reportedly died in unclear circumstances at the Tsavo East National Park. The programme was conducted jointly between Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) and the World Wide Fund (WWF). Last week, WWF acknowledged that the exercise posed life threats to the animals. This was through a statement shared through the media. “Translocating wild animals of this size is extremely challenging and not without risk, but black rhinos are under enormous threat so efforts to try and better protect them, such as translocation,…

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari opened the first phase of a new metro-rail service in Abuja, that cost the country $824 million (approximately Ksh82.4 billion). This translates to about Ksh280 million per kilometre, compared to Kenya’s Standard Gauge Railway that cost approximately Ksh560 million per kilometre, for rail only. The first phase of the Abuja light rail system has two lines with connections to the airport and the national rail network (3,505 km of 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) gauge lines and 479 km of standard gauge lines). The entire metro system is being built by China Civil Engineering and Construction Corp, partly funded…

UAE Exchange, a leading global money transfer, foreign exchange and payment solutions brand has re-branded its Africa operations to Unimoni. The rebranding exercise follows an earlier announcement made by UAE-based businessman and philanthropist, Dr Bavaguthu Raghuram Shetty, Founder and Chairman of the UAE Exchange Group. In April 2018, Dr Shetty launched Finablr, a holding company which, subject to regulatory approvals, aims to bring together his global portfolio of category-leading financial services brands including Unimoni, UAE Exchange, Travelex and Xpress Money under one umbrella. Announcing the changes, the Executive Director of Finablr and Group CEO Mr Promoth Manghat said that the…

Third-way Alliance Party Leader Dr Ekuru Aukot has bashed government spokesman Dr Erick Kiraithe for his statement  telling Kenyans working with SGR to bear with the Chinese mistreatment. In a statement sent to newsrooms, Dr Aukot said that Kiraithe should unconditionally apologise to all Kenyans. He said Kiraithe’s statement is ridiculous because the alleged mistreatment of Kenyan workers by the Chinese is unlawful and criminal and should never be tolerated “as long as we are a sovereign state and not an appendage of China”. “Our party is appalled and utterly disgusted by the statement issued by Mr. Erick Kiraithe, the…

Pesapal has integrated Visa on  Mobile (formerly mVisa) as a payment option into its payment processing platform. This will increase the availability of Visa on Mobile to over 21,000 businesses as a payment method both online as  well as on Pesapal Sabi, its Point of Sale solution. This new offering joins existing card payment  options from Visa, Mastercard and American Express as well as mobile money. “Our core aim is to help businesses provide their customers with a variety of payment options  and for those customers to transact seamlessly and securely on their mobile devices. Integrating  Visa on Mobile enables…

Paris-based USSD technology specialist, Myriad Connect, is seeking partnerships with local financial institutions and mobile phone service operators in a bid to provide out of band authentication and SIM swap detection service to combat fraud in mobile financial services. The new service will enable consumers and service providers to monitor the transactions in real time, according to Business Development Director for Africa Willie Kanyeki. The move has been informed by increasing cases of mobile money fraud, which is the most common case of financial fraud. Statistics show that 57% of digital financial fraud in Kenya is through mobile money while 32%…

Shoppers at Tuskys supermarket in Nakuru were treated to a delightful surprise when two half-naked sinewy men walked into the supermarket bringing everything to a halt. The two men with chiseled abs and toned bodies were covered in acres of paint and identified themselves as ‘Aliens in a supermarket’. Their sensational show first brought shock and confusion – understandably because they looked like actors from Black Panther. According to E-daily, one of the men in the video has been identified as Wilson Munene- a Kenyan celebrity fitness trainer and renowned model to boot. He was flanked on the side by…

Popular photo sharing social network Instagram has launched an exercise to allow users to have verified accounts, tagged with a blue tick. The exercise kicked off in Australia, becaming the first in the world to be able to apply for official recognition on the network. Currently, very few Instagrammers, perceived to be ‘celebs’ have verified accounts such as Lupita Nyong’o, Zari Hassan, Jeff Koinange, Chris Hemsworth, Kim Kardashian, and Justin Bieber. Instagram verification had previously been a secretive process, which some shadowy social media firms exploited by charging keen users up to Ksh2 million ($20,000) for the service. Read: Instagram Opens IGTv…

In April 2015, Kenya experienced one of the deadliest terrorist attacks which claimed the lives of 147 university students at Garissa University. When every country was sending a word of mouth to console Kenyans, Croatian students from Zagreb university decided to show it in action. 147 students lied down for 147 seconds at the university in solidarity with victims of Garissa university terror attack. Babu Owino, Embakasi East MP has led by example and has shown support for the Croatian team from the semi-finals where they turned tables to beat England during extra time. https://twitter.com/Babu_Owino/status/1017092194715492353 The Croatians rallied from behind to…

DStv has announced that from Friday (13 July) all of its customers will receive the full complement of SuperSport channels at no extra charge. In a statement released on Wednesday, DStv said that Access, Family, Compact and Compact Plus customers will be able to acces the channels until 31 July. Sporting events that will be accessible include the FIFA World Cup final and the third-place playoff match, the women and men’s Wimbledon finals, the German and Hungarian Formula One Grands Prix and the Super Rugby playoffs. Read: CBK Clears State Bank Of Mauritius To Take Over Chase Bank Others include…

Equity Group Holdings is set to open clinics outside Nairobi and Thika as the lender seeks a presence in all 47 counties over the next five years. Dr. James Mwangi, the CEO of Equity Bank says that the lender intends to open one health center dubbed ‘Equity Afia’ in every country in the next five years. The bank is currently sup-porting five clinics in Thika, Buru Buru, Ongata Rongai, Kayole and Kawangware. The health business is run as a franchised network under the bank’s social arm -Equity Group Foundation (EGF) -, which the regional lender says, offers “affordable and high…