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The OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) has signed a US$20 million public sector loan agreement with Kenya to increase regional connectivity, enhance trade and improve the socio-economic welfare of about 1.6 million people.

The loan will finance the upgrading of the 90 km Samatar - Wajir Road, a part of the North and North-Eastern Development Initiative Programme. The programme will better connect Kenya's northern region to the rest of the country, improving an important 739 km corridor linking Isiolo in the north with Mandera in the northeast (at the border with Ethiopia).

As with all OPEC Fund-financed projects, this investment aligns with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and with SDG 9 on industry, innovation and infrastructure in particular.

The OPEC Fund is co-financing the project with the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa, the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development, the Saudi Fund for Development and the government of Kenya.

The OPEC Fund and Kenya have been development partners for nearly 45 years. The organisation has provided public sector financing totaling close to US$195 million (including the present loan) to help support the country's agriculture, banking and financial services, communication, education, energy, financial, health, transportation and water and sanitation sectors.

OFID was established in January 1976 by the then 13 member countries of OPEC; including the United Arab Emirates. It is the development finance institution established as a channel of aid to developing countries. MENAFN

NANYUKI, KENYA - FEBRUARY 25: A woman walks alongside a railway line on February 25, 2016 in Nanyuki, Kenya. Situated in East Africa with a coastline on the Indian Ocean Kenya encompasses savannah, lakelands, the dramatic Great Rift Valley, mountain highlands and abundant wildlife such as lions, elephants and rhinos. From Nairobi, the capital, safaris visit the Maasai Mara reserve, known for its annual wildebeest migrations, and Amboseli National Park, offering views of Tanzania's 5,895m Mt. Kilimanjaro. Kenya gained its independence from British colonial rule in 1963 after an insurrection led by Jomo Kenyatta. (Photo by Ian Forsyth/Getty Images) Photographer: Ian Forsyth/Getty Images Europe , Photographer: Ian Forsyth/Getty Images Europe

 

(Bloomberg) -- Burundi and Tanzania are seeking to raise $1.9 billion for a railway linking the two East African nations that could help landlocked Burundi boost its mineral exports, an official said.

“Now is the time to start fund-raising” for the 190-kilometer (118 mile) line from Musongati in Burundi to Tanzania’s Isaka, said Dieudonné Dukundane, executive secretary of Central Corridor, a government-backed agency that promotes regional transport development.

The railway will be part of a broader project eventually connecting Tanzania to Burundi’s northern neighbor Rwanda, which will cost about $7.6 billion, according to the website of the Common Market of Eastern and Southern Africa.

Linking Burundi with Tanzania’s Dar es Salaam port could be a boon for the mining industry in the nickel-rich nation. The government in Bujumbura is targeting a 47% rise in mineral revenue in the 10 years to 2027.

Dukundane was speaking to reporters after a meeting of regional stakeholders in Burundi. - Desire Nimubona, Bloomberg News

 
 

Police spokesman Charles Owino.  Image: FILE/Photo Courtesy 

In Summary

• Police Spokesman Charles Owino has hinted of a plan to leave the uniformed service and venture into politics.

• Owino said he is competent enough to clinch the Siaya gubernatorial seat in the 2022 general election.

Police Spokesman Charles Owino has hinted at a plan to leave the uniformed service and venture into politics.

Owino said he is competent enough to clinch the Siaya gubernatorial seat in the 2022 general election.

Speaking on Mayienga FM, a vernacular radio station owned by the Kenya Broadcasting Corporation (KBC), Owino said as a graduate of political science and communications, he is well informed and aware of Kenya's dynamic political landscape. 

Owino said he is competent enough to seek the position.

While reiterating that he will ensure that Siaya county is completely transformed within 10 years, he said there is a need for leaders to initiate development projects that are beneficial to the people instead of promoting a culture of handouts.

“I will ensure that sustainable projects like water projects are initiated for the benefit of our people. With my tenure I will transform Siaya to be the best county because I have the brains to do so," he said.

Owino said he has served in different positions including as a trainer at the CID Training School.

"I studied political science and communications at university and so I understand what politics is,'' he said.

Asked to reveal more details on his plans, Owino said for now he could not because he is still actively in service.

He said he plans to retire from the service in December after he turns 51 in July. 

For now I am still in office and cannot delve much into matters of politics. What you should understand is that retirement is a process and at 60 years it is called forced retirement but from 50 you can retire early from public service," he said.

He said his sentiments on the vernacular radio were meant for Siaya constituents but when the right time comes, he would make an official announcement.

He said his plan is to contest on the ODM ticket because of the party’s popularity in Nyanza region.

“Even in the US, there are those States that are popular with either Democrats or Republicans and so you choose which party augers well with the people around you,” he said. By Patrick Vidija, The Star

A male giraffe, Lbarnoti, was rescued from flooded Kenyan rangeland using a custom barge and some patient training. CARO WITHEY, SAMATIAN ISLAND / SAVE GIRAFFES NOW

 

On a sunny day at Kenya’s Lake Baringo, a barge floated gently by. Its main passenger calmly munched on his favorite snack of acacia seed pods. At about 16 feet tall, he could easily peer around to take in his watery surroundings. But this was not some idyllic pleasure cruise. This trip, on January 27, 2021, was a rescue mission, to save Lbarnoti, a Rothschild’s giraffe, from floodwaters gradually rising around Longicharo Island, where he and some fellow ruminants had lived for a decade.

Lbarnoti was not the only one to get this treatment. In December 2020, two females, Asiwa and Pasaka, made the same trip, one at a time. They had all been carefully transferred by American-based nonprofit Save Giraffes Now in collaboration with Kenya Wildlife Service, the Northern Rangelands Trust, and local members of the Ruko community. Another six animals remain on the island.

The long-necked grazers are extremely challenging to move around, according to David O’Connor, president of Save Giraffes Now, who was present at the first rescue. Unlike elephants, rhinoceroses, and lions, who can be sedated while being transported, giraffe physiology makes this strategy risky for the animals. “Once they’re down and horizontal, which is not a natural position for them, potentially they could choke on their own saliva. Or because of their unique blood flow system, basically their brain could explode because of the high pressure of the blood going to the brain,” says O’Connor. “And how do you get the tallest creature on Earth across a mile of open lake to the mainland?”

The solution was a custom-built steel barge. Made by the Ruko community, it was specifically engineered to carry a tall creature weighing as much as 2,600 pounds, with a rectangular steel structure with reinforced sides atop a series of empty steel drums. ”Our hope all along had been not to tranquilize the giraffe at all, but really try to move them, with the amazing team on the ground, to slowly train them to be comfortable on the barge,” says O’Connor. The training is painstaking, involving food such as mangoes and acacia seed pods, and acclimating the giraffes to the barge. With Lbarnoti, the conservationists were able to lure him in voluntarily. Boats then gently pulled the barge an hour-long ride, past crocodiles and hippopotamuses. He arrived safely at the mainland sanctuary of the Ruko Community Wildlife Conservancy, a protected wildlife reserve, where he was reunited with Asiwa and Pasaka (both of whom actually had to be blindfolded and gently sedated for the trip).

There are significant reasons for all this effort. Rothschild’s giraffes are a subspecies—not only one of the tallest of their kind, but also one of the most endangered populations. They look different, too. They have five, nubby horn-like ossicones on their heads (other giraffes have only two), and they appear to be wearing white socks, since their markings fade halfway down their legs. Named for zoologist Lord Walter Rothschild, who observed them in the early 1900s (and founded the Natural History Museum at Tring in England), they once roamed in large numbers across the whole Western Rift Valley, where Lake Baringo is located, in Kenya and into Uganda. But in the mid-1900s, they disappeared from the area due to drought, loss of habitat, and poaching. Today, less than 3,000 are left in the world, with only about 800 in Kenya.

In 2011, eight Rothschild’s giraffes were reintroduced on Longicharo Island, originally an isolated, rocky peninsula lush with acacia trees, to try to increase their population away from poachers. But this past season’s intense rainfall saw water levels rise as much as six inches per day, cutting the area off from the mainland completely. The need to get the giraffes off the island is urgent. What was once 100 acres of habitat had shrunk to one or two acres, and food sources had grown scarce. O’Connor says, ”They’re a little bit skinnier than a normal giraffe…. With the dry season, there’s absolutely no food, so they’re depending 100 percent on supplemental feeding by the team.” With one percent of the Kenyan population on the island, each rescue is important. “Giraffes are undergoing a silent extinction, and each one matters greatly to the survival of these animals,” O’Connor adds.

“We must finish these rescues as quickly as possible,” says Susan Myers, founder and CEO of Save Giraffes Now, in a press release. There are plans to move two more female giraffes, depending on weather, staffing, and finances. The final move of the remaining four, including two calves, is hoped for in March 2021. The work is all part of a long-term plan. “ Once we rescue them, that’s not the end of it,” O’Connor says. “That’s actually just the beginning of trying to repopulate the entire Western Rift Valley with this type of giraffe, where they became locally extinct 70 years ago.” Watching Lbarnoti’s graceful gait on the other side of his trip makes one hope that many more generations will nimbly follow. - Winnie Lee, Atlas Obscura

President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto during Madaraka Day celebrations in Nairobi on June 1, 2020.

File | PSCU
 
 
What you need to know:
  • The ruling Jubilee Party is a quarrelsome, unhappy and dysfunctional union that, for obvious reasons, simply cannot deliver on its extravagant campaign promises.
  • President Kenyatta is, indeed, right to challenge his estranged deputy to resign instead of fighting the government from within.

I ’m beginning to feel that both President Kenyatta and Deputy President William Ruto should be arrested for a variety of criminal offences. They conned millions of voters that their union would unite Kenya and propel the country to greater heights of development and prosperity.

But now, with both going hammer and tongs at each other, directly and via proxies, it should be obvious that Kenya does not have a working government. 

The ruling Jubilee Party is a quarrelsome, unhappy and dysfunctional union that, for obvious reasons, simply cannot deliver on its extravagant campaign promises. It promised heaven on earth, but is instead delivering economic destruction and political infighting that, if not checked, could incite ethnic violence.

President Mwai Kibaki rescued Kenya from the destruction wrought by the pillage of President Daniel arap Moi’s disastrous regime. The “Dynamic Duo”, as they billed themselves, promised to build on that inheritance and take Kenya to the next level but, instead, engaged the reverse gear and drove the country back into a basket case. 

Noisy rabble

President Kenyatta is, indeed, right to challenge his estranged deputy to resign instead of fighting the government from within. But so long as he insists he has a firm hold on power, he must take direct responsibility for the mess Kenya is in.

The DP, and every one of his noisy rabble, should have the courage of conviction to quit the leadership positions they hold on a Jubilee ticket and formally take the opposition banner.

President Kenyatta should also take a walk in atonement for the destruction and confusion wrought under his leadership. He came to office joined at the hip with his deputy. Kenyans turned out in droves to vote for the pair; so, it would be unfair for one to remain if the other takes the fall. 

They jointly assumed secured votes through lies, fraud and other falsehoods — which is equivalent to obtaining goods by false promises.

Millions who so fervently believed in the Jubilee promise and lustily sang its praise up and down the country have been left bitter and disillusioned. They must be feeling particularly angry at their own foolishness.

Incompatible pair

They should have seen from the very beginning that UhuRuto was an incompatible pair united only for pursuit of power rather than shared interests and programmes.

Instead of displaying more foolishness in now supporting one or the other of the estranged pair, and being incited to hurl insults at the other, they should be the first to wise up and lead the campaign for the exit of both.

A fresh presidential election will provide Kenyan voters an early opportunity to atone for their mistakes. They will be granted the opportunity to elect honest and selfless leaders more interested in service than self-enrichment and power as an end in itself.

For this country to come out of the present rut, it needs visionary leaders, who can see beyond the next election. It needs managers who can design and implement the policies required to pull it out of the UhuRuto economic carnage. 

Kenya is in urgent need of salvation from thieves and looters, parochial ethnic chieftains, rabble-rousers and the usual retinue of sycophants and praise singers. This is urgent because we are running out of time. 

The drivel we are seeing every day from loose-tongued politicians indicates that the country is at breaking point and might not survive till the next General Election, scheduled for August 2022.

It is, therefore, imperative that an untainted leader takes the helm at the earliest opportunity to at least steady the ship and embark on the recovery mission.

This country is not short of people with skills, qualifications and experience to competently run a country. The problem is that we have forever been held hostage by scoundrels, whose only appeal is to ethnic mobilisation rather than any redeeming values, policy prescriptions and ideology.

The tragedy of Jubilee should have taught us all some very hard lessons: We are the ultimate sufferers when we elect the wrong leaders. Jubilee’s broken economy hits the thuraku, Kieleweke, Tangatanga and all other formations within it as hard as it hits the fellows who voted differently.

We can also state with certainty that no Kenyatta Kikuyu- or Ruto Kalenjin tribesman or woman benefited simply because one of their own was in power. The benefits of mismanagement and corruption went only to a very small group of close family, friends and business partners. 

It’s time Kenya got a fresh start, and we would be eternally indebted to Mr Kenyatta and DP Ruto if they gave us that opportunity. By Macharia Gaitho, Daily Nation

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