Kenya's Hon. Peter Mathuki. Photo Courtesy
Kenya’s Peter Mutuku Mathuki has been appointed to head the East African Community (EAC), the regional bloc that brings East African countries under one umbrella. Mathuki replaces Burundi’s Liberat Mfumukeko, whose five-year term ended early 2021. The post is usually rotational for five years.
As Secretary-General of the regional bloc, his key tasks include regional development, increasing inter-regional trade and to address investment possibilities for both potential internal and external investors.
According to his profile, Mathuki has worked as Executive Director at the East African Business Council, and consequently emerged as the top candidate for the position. Over the years, he has been dealing with the corporate business sector, and believed to have sufficient experience and contacts useful to address incessant wrangles in the East African Community.
Mathuki previously served as a member of the East African Legislative Assembly, chairing the Committee on Legal Affairs and Good Governance as well as Accounts, Trade and Investment.
He has held political positions in Kenya and in international bodies including the International Labour Standards at the former International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU-Africa), now ITUC-Africa, which he served as director. He was also a consultant for European Union programmes in Kenya.
Mathuki comes on board as the African continent implements the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AFCFTA) agreement, where he has been involved in the creation of the nascent African Business Council. Trading under this AfCFTA began on January 1, 2021 and opens up more opportunities for both local African and foreign investors from around the world.
Mathuki was taken on as a rectification strategy by Kenya, following a low-key leadership by Mfumukeko. Under his term, countries routinely skipped summits and member states wrangled over tariffs and political accusations. His secretariat faced financial constraints as member states delayed remitting their membership dues and donors reduced funding following allegations of corruption.
The latest report from the East African Community Secretariat for this year shows, for example, that South Sudan is the most indebted member of the EAC. It owes US$24.6 million in funding towards the main budget even though it should pay up to US$32.4 million including this year’s dues. It should also pay US$2.8 million to the Inter-University Council of East Africa and another US$345,000 to the Lake Victoria Fisheries Organization.
The main budget usually funds the operations of the EAC Secretariat, the East African Court of Justice, the East African Legislative Assembly and other bodies dealing with specified fields. The Secretary-General is the principal executive and accounting officer of the community as well as the secretary of the summit and serves for a fixed period of five years.
Many businesses and market players perceive the region as progressively stable for long-term beneficial business, investment and trade. With a combined population estimated at 173 million, the region is relatively large. The East African Community (EAC) is an intergovernmental organization composed of six countries in the Great Lakes region in Eastern Africa. The members are Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. - Kester Kenn Klomegah, Eurasia Review
• Atwoli said the bill was of importance since workers’ safety is a major concern to Cotu and its tripartite partners.
• The proposed law — to be cited as the Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes (Amendment) Act, 2020 — is set for publication and introduction in the National Assembly for consideration anytime this week.
The US House of Representatives approved a $1.9 trillion (€1.5 trillion) pandemic relief bill in a win for President Joe Biden, even as top Democrats tried assuring agitated progressives that they’d revive their derailed drive to boost the minimum wage.
The new president’s vision for flushing cash to individuals, businesses, states, and cities battered by COVID-19 passed on a near party-line 219-212 vote on early Saturday. That ships the massive measure to the Senate, where Democrats seem bent on resuscitating their minimum wage push, and fights could erupt over state aid and other issues.
Democrats said the still-faltering economy and the half-million American lives lost demanded quick, decisive action. GOP lawmakers, they said, were out of step with a public that polling shows largely views the bill favourably.
"I am a happy camper tonight," Congresswoman Maxine Waters from California said Friday. "This is what America needs. Republicans, you ought to be a part of this. But if you're not, we're going without you".
Republicans said the bill was too expensive and said too few education dollars would be spent quickly to immediately reopen schools. They said it was laden with gifts to Democratic constituencies like labour unions and funnelled money to Democratic-run states they suggested didn't need it because their budgets had bounced back.
"To my colleagues who say this bill is bold, I say it's bloated," said Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. "To those who say it's urgent, I say it's unfocused. To those who say it's popular, I say it is entirely partisan".
Moderate Democratic Representatives Jared Golden of Maine and Kurt Schrader of Oregon were the only two lawmakers to cross party lines. That sharp partisan divide is making the fight a showdown over who voters will reward for heaping more federal spending to combat the coronavirus and revive the economy atop the $4 trillion (€3.3 trillion) approved last year.
The battle is also emerging as an early test of Biden's ability to hold together his party's fragile congressional majorities — just 10 votes in the House and an evenly divided 50-50 Senate.
At the same time, Democrats were trying to figure out how to assuage progressives who lost their top priority in a jarring Senate setback on Thursday.
That chamber's non-partisan parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, said Senate rules require that a federal minimum wage increase would have to be dropped from the COVID-19 bill, leaving the proposal on life support. The measure would gradually lift that minimum to $15 (€12.50) hourly by 2025, doubling the current $7.25 (€6) floor in effect since 2009.
Hoping to revive the effort in some form, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is considering adding a provision to the Senate version of the COVID-19 relief bill that would penalise large companies that don't pay workers at least $15 an hour, said a senior Democratic aide who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal conversations.
That was in line with ideas floated on Thursday night by Senator Bernie Sanders, a chief sponsor of the $15 plan, and Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden to boost taxes on corporations that don't hit certain minimum wage targets.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi offered encouragement, too, calling a minimum wage increase "a financial necessity for our families, a great stimulus for our economy and a moral imperative for our country". She said the House would "absolutely" approve a final version of the relief bill because of its widespread benefits, even if it lacked progressives’ treasured goal.
While Democratic leaders were eager to signal to rank-and-file progressives and liberal voters that they would not yield on the minimum wage fight, their pathway was unclear because of GOP opposition and questions over whether they had enough Democratic support.
House Ways and Means Committee Chair Richard Neal sidestepped a question on taxing companies that don't boost pay, saying of Senate Democrats, "I hesitate to say anything until they decide on a strategy".
Progressives were demanding that the Senate press ahead anyway on the minimum wage increase, even if it meant changing that chamber's rules and eliminating the filibuster, a tactic that requires 60 votes for a bill to move forward.
"We’re going to have to reform the filibuster because we have to be able to deliver," said Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal from Washington, a progressive leader.
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, another high-profile progressive, also said Senate rules must be changed, telling reporters that when Democrats meet with their constituents, "We can’t tell them that this didn’t get done because of an unelected parliamentarian".
Traditionalists of both parties — including Biden, who served as a senator for 36 years — have opposed eliminating filibusters because they protect parties' interests when they are in the Senate minority. Biden said weeks ago that he didn't expect the minimum wage increase to survive the Senate's rules.
Pelosi, too, seemed to shy away from dismantling Senate procedures, saying, "We will seek a solution consistent with Senate rules, and we will do so soon".
The House COVID-19 bill includes the minimum wage increase, so the real battle over its fate will occur when the Senate debates its version over the next two weeks.
The overall relief bill would provide $1,400 (€1,150) payments to individuals, extend emergency unemployment benefits through August and increase tax credits for children and federal subsidies for health insurance.
It also provides billions for schools and colleges, state and local governments, COVID-19 vaccines and testing, renters, food producers and struggling industries like airlines, restaurants, bars and concert venues.
Democrats are pushing the relief measure through Congress under special rules that will let them avoid a Senate GOP filibuster, meaning that if they are united they won't need any Republican votes.
It also lets the bill move faster, a top priority for Democrats who want the bill on Biden's desk before the most recent emergency jobless benefits end on March 14.
But those same Senate rules prohibit provisions with only an "incidental" impact on the federal budget because they are chiefly driven by other policy purposes. MacDonough decided that the minimum wage provision failed that test.
Republicans oppose the $15 minimum wage target as an expense that would hurt businesses and cost jobs. Euronews
UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is deeply concerned by a series of messages of distress it has been receiving from a group of 10 asylum–seekers currently in a detention facility in Mutukula, in northwestern Tanzania. The asylum-seekers have expressed fears for their safety upon being deported from Tanzania.
UNHCR consistently advocates that refugees and asylum-seekers, including those who claim to be in need of international protection, cannot be returned to their countries of origin until their claims have been properly assessed by the competent authorities, in accordance with the principle of non-refoulement. Non-refoulement is an international principle that prevents states from expelling or returning persons to a territory where their life or freedom would be threatened.
UNHCR is appealing to the Government of Tanzania for immediate access to the detained asylum-seekers in order to assist with the assessments of their individual claims. UNHCR is hopeful that the responsible authorities in Tanzania will work with us to resolve this situation in accordance with their obligations under international law.
For more information on this topic, please contact: In Geneva, Babar Baloch, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., +41 79 513 9549
- UNHCR
SSPDF division one commander Major-General David Manyok Barach. Photo via Facebook
JUBA – South Sudan People’s Defense Forces’s Infantry Division 1 commander Major-General David Manyok Barach has died of coronavirus in the country’s capital Juba, following weeks of infection, according to several security sources.
General Barach died on Friday morning at a local hospital in Juba where he has been receiving life-saving treatment, according to a senior military officer close to him.
“This is to confirm the news on social media that Major General David Manyok Barach is no more,” the military source said. “He died this morning in a hospital here in Juba from the coronavirus and he tested positive for the coronavirus two weeks ago.”
‘Celebrated soldier’
South Sudanese social media users poured in condolence messages describing the late commander as a celebrated soldier who has contributed to the liberation of the world’s youngest country from 1983.
“South Sudan has just lost a liberator and a celebrated soldier, Major-General David Manyok Barac, who passed away with in Juba this morning,” one social media user wrote. “He will be missed by all and his achievements will live forever.”
Another social media user pointed to the army commander’s role in defense of the government in Juba following the outbreak of the civil war in December 2013 saying he saved the nation from collapse.
“Because of his love for his people and his country, he defended the country from collapse and if he wasn’t there for defense, Riek [Machar] would have takeover our government by force.” - Sudans Post
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