Whereas there are those who have argued that football fans without tickets for last weekend’s Kenya versus Gabon game did well to storm the Nyayo National Stadium, I wish to advance the view that the reprehensible means did not justify the end. Football, like all civilized activities, demands order, rule of law and predictability. As such, it was wrong for goons to breach one of the gates of the stadium and illegally access areas reserved for paying fans. This makes nonsense of the idea of ticketing. It beats logic for a law-abiding citizen to spend time and money acquiring a…
Author: Mbugua Ng’ang’a
Edward Kisiang’ani’s removal as Permanent Secretary for Broadcasting and Telecommunications on Thursday, March 20, marked a major turning point in the relationship between the government and the media. During his two-year stint, he muddied the waters so much that there is now no love lost between government and media. This at a time when the government has come under unrelenting criticism on social media, in large part because operatives like Kisiang’ani consider legacy media to be the cause of the government’s migraines, which have been worsening by the day, largely because of its intransigence. True, the relationship between the two…
June 27, 2021 would have passed as just another fun-filled and dusty day in the bundus of Hell’s Gate, Naivasha, where the Safari Rally championship was taking place. The then Sports minister, Amina Mohammed, had invited Lisa Christoffersen to enjoy the last leg of that year’s World Rally Championship (WRC) Kenya tour. Together with their friends and family, they were cheering on the roaring vehicles which were zooming towards the finishing ramp when Lisa noted a peculiar trend: There were no women drivers taking part in the rally! “I am only seeing ladies standing on the sidelines as cheerleaders,” she…
The drums of war have in the recent past thrust Goma, the capital of the North Kivu Province in the Democratic Republic of Congo, into the limelight for all the wrong reasons. Although this is a region that has a vibrant economic tempo, it has been rocked by armed conflict, with the most recent development being the entry into the city of M23 forces who ousted the military from the region. When the pulsating sounds of cultural and economic drums replace the roar of gunfire, Goma, a port city, comes alive as a thriving border town that is not only…
Politics, just like economics, is one of the key factors that determine the sharing of national resources. The only difference between the two is that in countries with elective politics, such as Kenya, the populace has a direct say in who controls political levers. These, in turn, determine the economic policies, and by extension fortunes, of the people and the country. When citizens cast their ballots, they are in effect delegating their power and authority to political players and mandating them to take actions that will have implications on the economy. When, for instance, Azimio One Kenya Coalition went to…
Every man is mortal. Wafula Wanyonyi Chebukati was a man, and he died aged 63 in a Nairobi hospital on the night of February 20, about a day after social media had killed him. Though he had left the office of chairman of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) in January 2023, he breathed his last without laying eyes on his successor, no thanks to the long drawn process to select the next set of commissioners. In a country where people in the public limelight are viewed through politically tinted lenses, it is no surprise that Chebukati was long…
Although the role of immigration in the creation of the African-American demographic has never been truly appreciated, it is now important to revisit it given the emerging trend of “reverse migration” engineered by the Trump administration. Although the initial waves of movement of people of colour from Africa to the US was involuntary to the extent that it was driven by the vicissitudes of slavery, the need for labour that drove this wave persisted even after emancipation, when a monetary value was assigned to the labour of African Americans under capitalism. Over the years, America – styling itself as the…
Azimio is the Majority Party in the National Assembly, the High Court has ruled, dealing a body blow to the ruling Kenya Kwanza Alliance. Justices John Chigiti, Jairus Ngaah and Lawrence Mugambi, in a far-reaching ruling that is set to trigger a political tsunami, said that the Azimio One Kenya Coalition Party, whose chairman is retired President Uhuru Kenyatta, has majority of MPs in the National Assembly. That effectively means that Kikuyu MP Kimani Ichungw’ah is no longer the Majority Leader after the courts dislodged the Kenya Kwanza Alliance from the perk it has enjoyed since Speaker Moses Wetang’ula ruled…
Over the last few days, there have been fears that various Kenyan projects funded by USAid are at risk of a funding freeze following an executive order issued by newly inaugurated US President Donald Trump. For sure, Trump’s return to the White House was bound to trigger a disruption in the donor funding model, among other areas, especially in view of his goal of re-orienting America’s foreign policy. This is, in turn, expected to create new pain points for non-governmental organisations and public agencies that have been relying on US government funding for survival. In past years, USAid has been…
That the President has appointed the new team that will select commissioners for the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) is a move in the right direction although it has come late in the day. It was even more encouraging that the Chief Justice moved with alacrity to swear in the selection panel, because this means they can get down to work right away and we will have a shortlist of commissioners and possible chairmen in the next 90 days. With the legal hurdles out of the way now, it behooves the selection panel to step up to the plate,…
