Author: NLM Correspondent

R apid urbanisation has provided most cities in the world with opportunities to provide more sustainable, vibrant, and prosperous centres for their citizens. But they must first address challenges such as inadequate infrastructure investments, pollution and congestion, and poor urban planning, according to a new report released last month. The report, ‘Creating Livable Cities: Regional Perspectives’, looks at urbanisation trends across emerging and developing economies in Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Eastern Europe, Southern and Eastern Mediterranean, and Latin America and the Caribbean is a joint publication by four regional development banks (RDBs) operating in these regions – African Development…

By Ndung’u Wainaina Since the UhuRuto regime came to power in 2013, the executive treatment of judiciary has been odious. The duo came to power on populist agenda. It had the honour to be the first regime to be elected under the progressive Constitution of Kenya 2010. Unfortunately, it has urinated on that honour. Judiciary was lucky to have a Chief Justice in willy Mutunga who entertained no nonsense from the Executive’s quest to cannibalise, capture and cripple institutions of governance. Predictably, the National Assembly succumbed with devastating consequences. On their attacks on the Judiciary, UhuRuto began with defying court…

By NLM Writer Sustainable funding levels are a prerequisite if state judiciaries are to dispense fair and timely justice and play their constitutionally mandated role in government. Achieving such funding should be a priority for the legislative and executive branches – which together control the purse – as well as the judiciary itself. It is often said in public discourse that court systems must be funded adequately to carry out their responsibilities in an expeditious and constitutional manner – which is to say “open and accessible” and can administer justice wholesomely and without undue delay. Yet “adequate” is usually defined…

By NLM Writer O ne of the promises that Chief Justice David Maraga made to Kenyans when he took office was that he would do everything in his power to reduce the backlog of cases that has historically dogged Kenyan courts. To his credit, he has continued in Mutunga’s footsteps in expanding the physical infrastructure, pushed for the employment of more judges as well as, in a host of circulars setting targets for Judges and Magistrates, compelled them to deal with backlog. But now, alongside his sudden mildness, government policy threatens to derail him. In a recent notice to government…

By Agencies Jagged, charred tree stumps jut out of blackened earth in what was once part of the rainforest in the Democratic Republic of Congo. One man, Rafael, standing amid the devastation, reckons he has set fire to around 40 sections of the forest near the city of Bandundu in the past two months. He bags the scorched wood and flogs it as charcoal in the capital, Kinshasa, some 250km away. Most of the city’s 12m residents, unable to afford gas or electric ovens, rely on charcoal for cooking. The Congo basin rainforest is the second biggest tropical forest in the…

BY Shadrack Muyesu The Constitution of Kenya 2010 is hailed as progressive on several accounts. The first is its Liberal Democratic nature. Inter alia, the demand for free, fair and regular elections allows the majority to rule while protecting the minority voice. The second is an elaborate human rights framework which, far from perpetuating a certain public culture and morality, accepts our differences and protects those who would otherwise have no place in this society. Thirdly the Constitution is anchored on the Diceian Rule of Law and separation of powers. In toto, it demands that no man shall be condemned…

By Jonathan Powell, Christopher Faulkner & Joshua Lambert Private military and security companies have been regular fixtures in conflicts across the globe. For Africa, these corporations became increasingly visible with their role in civil wars in Angola and Sierra Leone. More recently, reports in 2015 indicated the Nigerian government contracted a number of companies to aid in counterinsurgency efforts targeting Boko Haram. And a Russian contractor, the Wagner Group, has been actively involved in Sudan and the Central African Republic. Its involvement has included signing contracts that grant it access to potential diamond and gold deposits. Such agreements have been typical of private military and security…

By Tioko Ekiru Emmanuel The extractives sector has the capacity to transform lives and reduce poverty. Africa, for instance, is the only continent in the world with regular and constant discoveries of new oil fields and other industrial minerals. But, despite its wealth, the continent continues to remains underdeveloped. This scenario has given rise to the phrase “resource curse.” Where Sierra Leone, Nigeria, the Central Africa Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan lead in the famous resource curse phenomenon, Norway, Canada, Ghana and Botswana stand out as hubs of good governance in managing natural resources. Kenya’s growing extractives…

By Wafula Wakoko I recently had the misfortune of being in a forum where participants thought the Judiciary had too many activists – that it is a bane for law practice. In a different setting on legal reforms, constant reference to the principles of equality and non-discrimination was dubbed as populist and time-wasting activism. While the Oxford Dictionary defines an activist as a person who campaigns to bring about political or social change, the Urban Dictionary has a wealthier assortment of definitions – not a fair contrast given the modalities of assigning meanings by the two. In 2004, Urban Dictionary…

By Kevin Motaroki Fred Matiang’i is something of an enigma in executive apparel, but there is never ambiguity to his method. He is the most consequential minister in Uhuru Kenyatta’s government. His ascendancy to the echelons of power has been as a result of a schism in a burgeoning nation’s certainties, within a dicey political scenario, which required the ruling Jubilee Party to want to be able to predict, with an appreciable degree of assurance, that certain core foundational and developmental functions, at a time of raised passions, would be adjudicated by a rational, liberal mind. Since his appointment in…