By David Onjili There exist a group of sportsmen and women who transcend the sports disciplines they are famed for. They end up being political and (or) cultural symbols that stand the test of time. With this new found status, they sharply divide opinion. Mohamed Ali, Diego Maradona, Roberto Baggio are just but a few. Egyptian born and former Al Ahly player, Mohamed Aboutrika stands heads and shoulders above all in the African continent. Born in 1978 in the town of Giza, Aboutrika was to hone his skills at second division side Tersana. It is here that the first documented…
Author: NLM Editor
By Alexander Opicho Recently, over fifty officers working with the Kenya Revenue authority (KRA) were arrested for engaging in doing corruption, including receiving bribes to falsify tax records so. That incident brought to mind Shakespeare’s words in the Measure for Measure: ‘The tempter or the tempted, who sins most?’ I read the Measure for Measure when I was sixteen – this is about three decades ago. But when the media, in May 2019, reported fifty plus young men and women between the ages of twenty and forty five, earning a decent and middle-income monthly salary, living above want and poverty,…
By Cynthia Wairimu It is said that you must be strong and not show weakness to anyone lest it is used against you to bring you down. In our age, there is a growing façade of happiness, especially where social events and social media are involved, where the idea is to keep smiling, and not broadcast your sorrows to the world but instead hide it all under a mask of pure bliss. This might have worked for a minute or two until news started to show up of suicides, homicides, femicide, angry outbursts to what would be trivial issues and…
By NLM Writer The concept that you can get ahead on your work and talents, also called meritocracy, is something we mostly agree is good. We also equate it with a fairer society, one where the social order is not determined by birth but one which gives us some sort of agency over our futures. However the term itself was coined as a warning. So why do we believe in it so strongly? Entire cultures and societies are formed around the concept of meritocracy. It has become a leading social ideal. Politicians across the ideological spectrum continually return to the…
By Dennis Ndiritu The High Court breathed life into the gasping war on corruption in July this year when Justice Mumbi Ngugi declined an order of revision from Samburu Governor Moses Lenolkulal which challenged a ruling from the magistrates court that barred his access to office pending the hearing and determination of his graft case. In the case, Lenonkulal is charged with five counts in ‘ACC No. 3 of 2019: R v Moses Lenolkulal and 13 others’ thus: four counts under the Anti-corruption and Economic Crimes Act (ACECA) and the offence of unlawful acquisition of public property contrary to Section…
By Chrispin Bosire “Being a lawyer is not merely a vocation. It is a public trust, and each of us has an obligation to give back to our communities. Do and act on what you believe to be right, and you will wake up the next morning feeling good about yourself.” For a long time now, public perception has painted advocates in bad light. Some people refer to the members of the legal profession as a “necessary evil” while others simply dismiss them as cardinal agents of Satan on dry land. Be that as it may, advocates actually play a…
By Shadrack Muyesu In July 2009, Kasama Kimani visited a traditional herbalist in a desperate attempt to help his ailing daughter. With the help of one Lydia Wanjiku, he visited the healer Felix Irungu Karamba who at that time had pitched tent at a Joska Hotel room in Ngara. Irungu performed some rituals and offered him some herbs which he promised, would cure his daughter. He then transferred some Sh900, 000 to Irungu as payment for services rendered and also as fees to facilitate the acquisition of more herbs. Despite the performance, Kimani’s daughter got worse – which fact prompted…
By Daniel Benson Kaaya The Premier League is arguably the best in the world – attracting the best players and managers in the game. The summer transfer window closed on August 8 but not without some nail biting moments for fans across the world. One of the most intriguing transfers concerned Argentine maestro Paulo Bruno Exequiel Dybala’s proposed move to Tottenham Hotspurs from Juventus FC. In spite of protracted negotiations running into the final hours of the transfer window, the transfer did not materialise. Fees and wages weren’t the issue as is the norm with other transfers; it’s Dybala’s image…
By Lord Jonathan Sumption Transcribed by Kevin Motaroki Human rights are where law and politics meet. It can be an unfriendly meeting. A few years ago the then Prime Minister, speaking to the House of Commons, described a recent Supreme Court judgment about human rights as “appalling”. The same Prime Minister, on a later occasion, said about another human rights decision that it made him “physically sick”. These are strong words. What’s the fuss about? There is nothing new about human rights apart from the name. A quarter of a millennium ago Sir William Blackstone, the author of the earliest…
At the end of the 20th Century, mobile technology in Africa was still a new, unknown product. As a result, only about one percent of the population owned mobile phones. As the years went by, this changed as the continent embraced the technology which saw it referred to as the mobile phone continent. According to the Digital 2019 report, as of the start of 2019, mobile subscriptions in the continent had grown to 80 percent, meaning out of a population of 1.3 billion people, one billion are now mobile users. Compared to most of the other continents, mobile phones have…