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ODM leader Raila Odinga when he acknowledged greetings from the people of Ongata Rongai, Kajiado County on January 10, 2021.
Image: RAILA ODINGA/TWITTER

ODM boss Raila Odinga has once again hit out against Deputy President William Ruto's hustler campaigns, saying he is determined to agitate for class war.

The former prime minister said the best way to empower the poor is by providing opportunities and not fighting the rich. 

"In an economy, there will always be the rich and the poor, but you don't deprive the rich to give the poor," Raila said. 

He went on: "..but what this one (Ruto) is doing is purely agitating for class war."

The DP has been insisting that the country is ripe for a radical shift in its economic management saying the bottom-up model is the best remedy to empower the poor.

He has trashed the current system which he has termed as a trickle-down economic model that he argues has only enriched a few Kenyans.

The ODM boss said his government, under the Azimio La Umoja, will create opportunities for the poor to create wealth and broaden the middle-income bracket.

"The Azimio journey is on to unite the country and bring all Kenyans together," he said.

The ex-PM spoke on Monday in Naivasha after a meeting with nearly 30 governors supporting his Azimio La Umoja movement.

He said his administration will seek to strengthen devolution and push for the establishment of industries in every sub-county. 

"We will have one sub-county, one industry, one product to spur the country's industrialization," he said.

During the meeting, Raila asked governors to spearhead the ongoing mass voter registration in their regions which started on Monday.

"Today is a very important day because the exercise for voter registration has started, let us go down there and mobilize our young people to register to participate in the most important election in our history," he said. Edited by D Tarus/By James Mbaka, The Star

South African Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo attends the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, where South Africa's former president Jacob Zuma is summoned to face a state corruption inquiry, in Johannesburg, South Africa, February 15, 2021. REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko

No self-respecting theatre critic would dream of reviewing a three-Act play during the interval at the end of the first Act. But that is what one is compelled to do after South Africa’s State Capture Commission released Part 1 of its inquiry report.

This is more so because those implicated by its findings will be doing all they can to undermine the credibility of its reports. And in keeping with this dramatic theme, spoiler alert: My view is that deputy chief Justice Raymond Zondo, who chaired the commission, has nailed it. In response, many will ask the question: has he really? And, even if he has: so what? 

In light of the apparent weaknesses in South Africa’s state capacity and institutions, there is understandable scepticism as to whether the government has the technical capability, let alone the political will, to implement the many recommendations that are emerging from the painstaking labour of the deputy chief justice and his small band of support staff and lawyers.

Without this, the Zondo Commission will merely have been an exercise in catharsis – not the first steps to delivering justice and accountability.

The hearings themselves, and the extraordinary range of evidence that was adduced before the Commission, certainly provided catharsis, but also ‘truth’.

For those with open eyes, the denuding of democratic state legitimacy was uncovered and the key protagonists – both perpetrators and victims – were identified.

The democratic state was captured; key institutions were looted as vast sums of public money were stolen. Former president Jacob Zuma and his motley network of exploited and exploitative allies were responsible.

That much is abundantly clear from just part one of Zondo’s report. Now they must be held fully to account. Justice will need to be done.

What is in it

Zondo was appointed to chair the Commission almost four years ago in January 2018. This was after then-President Zuma had tried and failed to prevent it from being established as a part of the remedial action required by then Public Protector Thuli Madonsela in her October 2016 ‘State of Capture’ report.

The Commission’s first hearing was six months later. Thereafter it sat for more than 400 more days, interviewing 300 witnesses and yielding 75,000 pages of transcription.

In all, 1,438 individuals and institutions have been implicated, according to the introduction to the document published on 4 January.

Given the cost of the inquiry – and the 1.7 million pages of evidence – a further question arises: was it worth the time, effort and expense? Having read through the 874 pages of this first part, a number of notable features emerge.

First of all, it is lucid and cogent, despite the regrettable absence of an executive summary. The public will have to wait until the publication of Part 3 of the report at the end of February to review the executive report.

Despite this unusual inversion, the executive report will still matter a great deal, and will require skilled wordsmithery if it is to provide the public with a clear story line.

This will, in turn, help ensure that the report remains ‘alive’ in the public eye and does not get pushed into the background by other events – as has happened with similar reports in the past, such as the Asmal report on Chapter Nine institutions as well as the Farlam report on Marikana massacre. To allow the report to gather dust would be a huge waste of the investment in the Zondo Commission.

Despite the absence of an overarching narrative summary, each chapter of part one presents an intricate and fascinating account of how three public entities – South African Airways (SAA), the government’s information arm (GCIS) and the South African Revenue Service (SARS) – were systematically ‘captured’ with criminal intent, and how misinformation, both through the diversion of public funds to a puppet-media organisation, The New Age, and the subversion of GCIS, was used to try and cover up what was going on.

There were notorious key ringmasters, some well known already. These include Zuma, former SAA chair Dudu Myeni and Mzwanele Manyi, Zuma’s current spokesman and the man who was helicoptered in to head GCIS after the incumbent Themba Maseko was summarily dismissed, according to the report, at the behest of the Gupta family.

But, now, a much wider cast of accomplices and useful idiots are exposed. Private entities, such as the consulting firm Bain, where the evidence of whistleblower Athol Williams is applauded by Zondo, were also deeply complicit.

Secondly, it reads like a legal judgment, which is how it should be. The concern was that Zondo might fail to grasp the nettle and either shirk the most difficult issues or fudge its findings – as the Marikana massacre report did, on the core issues such as police culpability in the murder of the miners. He has not.

Assisted by some trusted former judicial colleagues, but under his attentive eye, Zondo has recognised the need to be both specific and precise. As a mountain of evidence was combined and the report constructed, the strategy was to provide a sound basis for prosecutions. The dots have now been joined.

A vast database of evidence can now be placed at the disposal of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation, known as the Hawks, and the National Prosecuting Authority.

In due course, no doubt, the legal coherence and rationality of the report will be tested in court. There will be numerous judicial review applications that will seek to obscure the picture and delay justice. It may be another four years before the whole process concludes – the completion of the Commission’s work is just the start.

Thirdly, flowing from the findings, part one of the report offers concrete recommendations. Some recommend that certain implicated persons are either investigated or prosecuted. In other instances, the report addresses institutional failings or legal gaps.

So, for example, in chapter four of this first part – on public procurement – Zondo recommends that a new institution be created to which whistleblowers can go (a Public Procurement Anti-Corruption Agency), and, furthermore, that the new agency have authority to negotiate a financial incentive for potential whistleblowers.

These are very concrete recommendations. They should be taken seriously, but they are not uncontroversial, and will require further debate.

Nonetheless, what Zondo is doing, in addition to providing the evidential bedrock so that those responsible can be held criminally to account for their abuse of power, is setting out how the governance system needs to be strengthened. By the time part three is published at the end of February, a substantial reform agenda will have been laid out.

The end game

Even with two Acts of this play to go, it is reasonable to conclude that Zondo has played his part. Now it will up to the government to deliver, and for the public, civil society and the media to ensure that it does.

But there will be many more twists in the plot. There will be lawfare, attempts to subvert the criminal justice system, which is still recovering from state capture. The power struggle within the governing African National Congress in the run-up to its five-yearly national elective conference at the end of this year will be even more bloody as a result.

If the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu was the moral compass of the nation, then Zondo is constructing an ethical map. How South Africa navigates its course in the coming years will define its long-term future.The Conversation

Richard Calland, Associate Professor in Public Law, University of Cape Town The African Report

Fear has gripped residents of Githuguya village in Ndia Constituency, Kirinyaga county following a sudden spate of pythons.

According to the residents, the invasive snakes are mostly slithering their way into their farms and compounds in search of food thus paralyzing their daily duties.

They say, as a result, most of them are unable to carry out their farming activities since they fear the deadly serpents can attack them unawares.

Wilson Wambugu, a resident, says for some time now he has encountered the snakes while going about his businesses.

“They have now become a menace as they have increased in numbers. It is such a scary experience,” Wilson said.

Lucy Ndegwa another resident narrates that she now no longer accesses her farm for fear of bumping into a python.

According to her, the few mango trees in her farm have become safe haven for one of the pythons ever since her neighbour cleared her bushy farm.

Ndegwa says they fear for their children who most times have to walk to schools unaccompanied. 

“It’s horrifying to even think that during this mango season, children can climb up the trees in search of fruits and are unaware of the imminent danger. Not so long ago, one of my neighbours found a python in her compound and had to run for safety,”

Another neighbour Ann Wangare echoed her sentiment saying they fear that their livestock will start dwindling in the wake of the menace at hand. She says she fears releasing her two calves to graze for they can be attacked anytime.

The residents are now calling on the government to be swift in action before the deadly serpents can cause havoc. In addition, they want the government to establish a KWS office as many human-wildlife conflict-related cases have been reported from across the county.

“It becomes difficult to rely on the KWS office in Embu as they take time to respond to our concerns. We would like to appeal to the government to establish an office in Kirinyaga county so that our worries can be solved without much delay,” another local said.

Their cries come weeks after residents from Ngando village in Ndia decried the rise of hippos.

According to them, the animals have attacked four people including a 68-year-old widow. By Richard Mugo, K24

A court in Kigali will begin hearing the case of ‘Hotel Rwanda’ hero Paul Rusesabagina on Monday after prosecutors appealed against his 25-year prison sentence, saying it was “lenient”.

The prosecution appealed against a September 20, 2021 that found Rusesabagina guilty of eight charges following a seven-month long trial.

Rusesabagina faced nine charges, including terrorism, murder, arson, abduction and forming an armed rebel group.

The crimes are linked to activities of the coalition of an exiled opposition group Rusesabagina formed dubbed MRCD and its armed outfit FLN, which is linked to the deadly 2018 and 2019 attacks in southern and western Rwanda.

Prosecutors had sought a life sentence for the 67-year-old Rwandan native who also holds Belgium citizenship and US permanent residence.

His family and supporters rejected the case as politically motivated, and did not appeal the verdict. 

Rusesabagina and his legal counsel boycotted the trial after he indicated he expected no justice from the court.

He protested the court’s refusal to allow him six months to prepare his defence and be represented by his Belgian lawyer.

Rusesabagina, a former hotelier-turned-political activist, rose to fame after a 2004 Hollywood movie, Hotel Rwanda, that depicted his heroic acts in saving Tutsis during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.

Callixte Nsabimana, aka, Sankara, one of his 20 co-accused who is former spokesperson and commander of the FLN rebels, was handed 20 years in prison, alongside seven other convicts.

They were found guilty of crimes, including being members of a terror group, committing terror acts, mobilisation and illegal use of explosives.

Other convicts were handed three to 10-year jail terms. By Johnson Kanamugire, The East African

 

Prizewinning Kenyan author Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o has written about independent Kenya's first Attorney General Charles Njonjo, following Njonjo's passing on January 2.

In a piece published by Nation, Ngũgĩ recounted details he can recall from Njonjo's time as AG, including an order that saw the author detained at Kamiti Maximum Security Prison.

The Weep Not, Child author recalled Mr Njonjo making a mockery of his [Ngũgĩ] decision to drop his English given name during a parliamentary session. The author added that the late Njonjo mocked everyone who chose to use only their native names.

"I am not personally bitter against him. I have always thought he exemplified a larger problem in the European language speaking African elite, their normalisation of the abnormality of the colonial mindset, which assumes Europe is the beginning of our being," wrote Ngũgĩ, an advocate of cultural pride.

 

He went on to narrate the story of Maurice Tito Gacamba, a Kenyan inventor whose scrap-metal plane flew for a few minutes and crashed in 1969.

The River Between author faulted Njonjo for killing Gacamba's dream when the then AG barred Gacamba from flying planes, requiring the self-taught inventor to acquire an aviation license first.

"I am less interested in the fact that Njonjo stopped Gacamba from flying than in the symbolism of the two men, in their attitudes toward their native land," Ngũgĩ stated before elaborating on the differences.

The author pointed out that the Duke of Kabeteshire had gone as far as cultivating an English accent, beside having pursued education in South Africa and London which qualified him as a UK barrister.

Labelling it as 'Njonjoism', Ngũgĩ has charged Kenyans to rethink the mtumba (imported second-hand clothes) industry, whose worth exceeds that of 'Made in Kenya' apparel.

"Njonjo and his English accent were not an accident, nor were his acts those of a lone wolf. Is the Njonjo mentality any different than that of Kenyans who now run schools which promote British National Curriculum? Or those Kenyans who licensed Mitumba industry of used clothes from Europe? We exchanged 'the made in Kenya' spirit for used in Europe.

"The only way of fighting Njonjoism is to reject the ruling Mitumba culture and reconnect ourselves to the we-can-do-it spirit of Gacamba and Kenyan people," the author charged. By Miriam Mwende, Pulse

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