By JULIUS MBALUTO 

Harriet Mukenyi has emerged the winner during Face of Kenya UK contest. The well attended event took place at the National Royal Hotel in London and was graced by the new Kenyan Ambassador to the UK H.E Catherine Karemu Wahome with other notable Kenyan leaders with many people from all walks of life.    

The winner Harriet Mukenyi is a certified Health Care Assistant and a model. The contest wasn't a walk in the park, she faced tough competition from other strong candidates namely, Isaura Apuyo, Margaret Mkala, Job Mathigu, Eva Marie Kendi and Solomon Miano who showcased their talent to a positive reception from those who attended. 

Speaking at the event H.E Catherine Wahome  said that the Government of Kenya was ready to support Kenyans in the Diaspora but Kenyans ought to know that issues might not be addressed right away. She pointed that the concept of public participation slows down efforts but the law must be followed. As well, Kenyans must pro-active, take initiative and engage with the Embassy.  

She said she was delighted to be at the event and encouraged Face of Kenya to keep doing the good work. The event was treated to great performances. Former Mayor of Barking and Dagenham Dr Elizabeth Kangethe praised the work done by Face of Kenya  UK. 

The Ambassadors had raised funds to support charitable work by Face of Kenya UK. They are supporting the installation of water project for the Lenkishon community in Kajiado, Kenya.

Turkish doctors perform the keloid mass removal surgery in Jinja, Uganda, Sept. 28, 2024. (AA Photo)

Ugandan patient had a 5-kilogram (11.02-pound) keloid mass removed during a health event organized by the Friends of All Africa Association (TADD). This event was in cooperation with the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA) and Uganda’s Ministry of Health.

A volunteer medical team from Türkiye, including doctors, nurses, anesthesia technicians, and civil society members, provided free examinations and surgeries to hundreds of Ugandans over 11 days. 

The 18-member group of specialists in general surgery, urology, ENT, gynecology, and plastic surgery examined approximately 1,500 individuals and performed nearly 100 surgeries. Among the patients was 39-year-old Muhammed Ramazan, from whom doctors removed the massive keloid mass weighing about 5 kilograms.

Professor Dr. Mehmet Dadaci, vice dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Necmettin Erbakan University and an expert in plastic and reconstructive surgery, described the keloid case as the largest he had ever seen. 

"We encountered a keloid of a size I have never encountered in my career,” Dadaci said. The 20-centimeter-long (7.87-inch-long) mass extended down from the patient’s neck and also affected the area behind his ears. Despite the usual preference for nonsurgical treatment of keloids, the team successfully excised the keloid mass, greatly improving the patient’s quality of life.

Keloids occur when the body’s healing mechanism continues producing scar tissue long after a wound has healed. Dadaci noted that such cases are particularly common among individuals of African descent. "The patient had lived with the mass for seven to eight years under difficult conditions, but he has now been freed from it,” he added.

TADD’s Ankara representative, Cuneyd Tiryaki, highlighted the broader significance of the surgery. "This operation not only improved the patient’s health but also his family life, work life and social integration,” Tiryaki said, noting that without intervention, the patient would have faced lifelong struggles due to financial constraints and the shortage of medical staff in Uganda. "We believe this surgery has had a significant impact on the patient’s life, both before and after the procedure. We’re proud to have been part of such a meaningful effort.”

The patient was discharged following the successful procedure. By Anadolu Agency

My first-experience of Rwanda was while serving with the UN in the months after the horrific civil war and genocide of 1994. In the months preceding July, 1994, the Tutsi minority ethnic group, moderate Hutu and Twa, were brutally murdered by armed Hutu militias. In the immediate aftermath, a community leader from the Tutsi (himself living clandestinely in fear of his life in Kigali) told me, “It was a hundred days of mass murder and unparalled bestiality of man against man, mass rape and attacks on women, and followed tens of hundreds of days of covert attacks and underlying mass fear, when everyone in Rwanda had sleepwalked into such wholescale atrocity”. I returned for several subsequent elections, including that of July 2024. 

In polls that were immediately criticised for disqualifying genuine opposition, the incumbent President Kagame, was ostentatiously elected for a fourth term. If the figures provided by the Rwandan Electoral Commission can be believed, Kagame got over 99% of the vote and a 98.2% turnout. He was then ceremoniously inaugurated to continue his rule on 11 August. This writer spoke to a motley crew of what might count as political opposition, in the wake of this apparently unanimous victory. As you might expect the opposition were angry and unconvinced. One person told me under conditions of secrecy:

We are worse than a dictatorship – this man does not even have any immediate succession plan and the only way he would ever be stopped is with a bullet- the same way he forced his way into power. Things have never been so far, and it breaks our hearts to know there is no hope.

As another opposition figure acknowledged at our closed-door meeting in a church hall, Kagame was methodical in securing his power: 

A referendum in 2015 approved constitutional amendments that would allow him to run for a third term in office in 2017, as well as shortening presidential terms from seven to five years. This was a kind of camouflage to weaken the secrecy in which the incumbent was effectively stealing his way to stay in control for good.  Again, nothing was done about it. He  openly told the French Ambassador in the presence of the French Press that he intended to run for president yet again in the 2024 election, despite having already served three terms in office, and there was only the feeblest of objections. Even the EU said very little at the time.

A prominent Tutsi statesman summarised the situation which the latest election now consolidated:

Kagame’s rule is not only authoritarian it is absolute and with the July 2024 election he has taken another step towards positioning himself as yet another of the old-style African leader-for-life that most of us thought were largely ghosts of a bitter past. One of the leading objective analysts, Freedom House, describe Kagame as an autocrat ordering relentless levels of surveillance, intimidation, torture and renditions or suspected assassinations of exiled dissidents. Another top international body, Human Rights Watch show the widespread extent to which Kagame’s forces have “arrested and threatened political opponents.

Freedom House described the July 2024 elections in Rwanda as entirely flawed, citing “widespread ballot stuffing, political intimidation, the elimination or silencing or arrest of blocking of opposition leaders and systematically undemocratic practices. Kagame had announced his Presidential bid on 20 September 2023 , declaring “I am happy with the confidence that the Rwandans have shown in me. I will always serve them, as much when I can”. Kagame’s campaign was endorsed by all of Rwanda’s ruling government coalition, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), including the Ideal Democratic Party, the Democratic Union of the Rwandan People, the Prosperity and Solidarity Party, and the Rwandan Socialist Party. He was also endorsed by the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party. 

Just before the election, the activist Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza reminded Rwandans, “that while recognising Kagame’s achievements while President, his greatest achievement would be stepping aside to let a peaceful transfer of power take place”. In the few years preceding this, Kagame had done everything possible to undermine Ingabire’s credibility with imprisonment, an alleged smear campaign, police intimidation of her party base and numerous alleged dirty tricks which made Ingabire look politically inept. Worse still, her potential voter base experienced mixtures of the Rwandan state’s administration crude attempts to persuade them to endorse Kagame.

Ingabire had been convicted in 2010 for threatening state security and downplaying the Rwandan genocide by asking why no Hutu victims were included in the state’s official memorial. There was a large-scale if sometimes subtle campaign to undermine her political influence, culminating in her being formally excluded from running on 13 March 2024. I had the opportunity to speak to Ingabire just after the election results were declared:

These results were exactly what everyone expected to hear but not in their heart of hearts what the Rwandan people wanted to hear. True Rwandans do not want this charade of a governmental stability dressed up as a man of benign dictatorship. Believe me, there’s absolutely nothing benign or charitable about Kagame. The man is a Putin, another Idi Amin….a thug. He is every bit as bad as any of the dictators who have exploited Africa over all of these years in all but his capacity to keep his dark deeds largely out of the papers- because he has sacked or arrested most of the newspaper editors. And yet the international community, including France, will continue to work with him if for no other reason than they consider that at this time there is no realistic alternative to him – and that is only because in a cunning way he has eliminated all credible opposition- and silenced those who would offer an alternative opinion. And if anyone seeks to oppose that party line they are immediately thrown in prison for treason or anti-state activity. It is like some old-style African dictatorship like the return of an Adi Amin except that he is much more cleaver in covering his tracks.

On 7 June the Rwandan electoral commission confirmed Kagame, Frank Habineza and Philippe Mpayimana, an independent, as the final candidates for the presidential election, a re-run of 2017. The applications of six other candidates, including Diane Rwigara of the People Salvation Movement, were rejected.  The Independent dubbed his election as “widely criticised as unfair”, while Amnesty International regretted the “a chilling effect” of Kagame’s censorship laws.

During the 2024 election campaign Kagame had pledged to continue his policies upon re-election. Opponent, Habineza opposed arbitrary detentions under Kagame. Another “rival” Mpayimana had said he offered  “political maturity” in the country. With the election results declared, Ms Ingabire continued, “the question now remains [whether] he will now start to devise a succession plan with his cronies, or will be so greedy that he will just change the law to allow him to lead until he is ready for his grave”.               Martin Duffy, E -International Relations

Azimio leaders on Sunday cancelled last-minute rallies that had been lined up in Kitengela and Mlolongo. Wiper Party leader Stephen Kalonzo Musyoka said the move to abruptly call off the rallies was reached after consultations following security concerns.

Addressing a press conference at a Kitengela hotel, Kalonzo who was accompanied by Democratic Action Party of Kenya (DAP-K) leader Eugene Wamalwa, Jubilee Secretary General  Jeremiah Kioni, former Kiambu governor Ferdinard Waititu, politician Jimmy Wanjigi and Kajiado deputy governor Martin Moshisho, said the presence of police officers in the area meant that the officers were ready to disrupt the rally and course chaos. 

"We had earlier planned to attend a Sunday service at the African Inland Church (AIC) Mlolongo but the information we have is that  DCI officers has this morning (Sunday) stormed the church and warned the presiding pastor not to allow us there.  The same thing has happened at AIC Kitengela church where we intended to attend a service later'' said Kalonzo. 

The Wiper leader accused President William Ruto of trying to intimidate those who are against his leadership.

"We are peaceful people, and therefore we don't want to subject the people of Kitengela to chaos and teargas. Our intention is very clear that the people of Kenya are not happy with his leadership, I wonder why they are following us every where we go and for what reason," posed Kalonzo.

The opposition leaders were in the area to to console the  Kitengela three - Bob Njagi, Jamil Longton and his brother Longton Aslam - who were allegedly abducted by police and later set free after being held incommunicado for one month. 

Kalonzo attributed the abductions to impunity by rogue police officers who he claimed were on a mission to destroy the country’s future. Jamil and his brother Aslam were dumped in Gachie while Njagi was found in Thogoto on the night of September 19.

''We are here to condemn in the strongest terms possible the arrest of the three young men , Bob Njagi, Jamil  Longton and his brother Aslam. Although the police denied the act, we are asking who else in Kenya is allowed to have handcuffs, only the police and that's why we hold them accountable for this action,'' said the Wiper boss. 

“They are responsible for the attempt to diminish, dismember and destroy our beloved Republic's present and future.” he added.

According to Kalonzo, the acts of abductions were meant to systematically limit, abuse, and silence Kenyans' constitutionally guaranteed rights to free speech.

Following the abhorrible act, Kioni disclosed that the opposition is planning to seek justice at the international level. 

"We are going to seek intervention in an international court, we have advised our lawyer Mr Paul Mwangi to start the process,'' said Kioni.

Wamalwa condemned President William Ruto's leadership style claiming the Head of State was in the process of returning the country back to dark days when government critics were taken by the police never to be seen alive.

''We were told that Nyayo chambers were closed, we have now realized that the government has opened other torture chambers in  Nairobi and its environs where they hold people incommunicado, starve them almost to death, and when there's pressure from the public they dump them. We are here to condemn that and say we will not sit and watch this again,'' stated Wamalwa. By Peterson Githaiga, The Standard