Category: Public Square
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Why Africa Is Not A Country And Other Short Stories
African writing and ways of being should not be shaped or influenced by Western notions of what it means to be African.
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Kenyans Have Abdicated Their Social Contract With Each Other
For the social contract between Kenyans to be restored, we must seek alternative leadership that understands that when the social contract in a society is broken, that society breaks down. We must confront uncomfortable truths about ourselves and our past.
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The Complex Search for Suspected Rwandan Genocidaires
The prosecutor of a United Nations tribunal has announced that his office has concluded its hunt for individuals who were suspected to bear the most responsibility for the 1994 Rwandan genocide. The Chief Prosecutor of the UN’s International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT), Serge Brammertz, said on May 15 he is winding up his…
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Why Charging for ID Cards Is A Bad Idea
Getting a National ID, the universal Kenyan rite of passage, has just been tapped as a money-earner by the Kenya Kwanza government. According to a (revoked after public outcry) error-filled Gazette Notice signed by Prof. Kithure Kindiki, the Cabinet Secretary for Interior and National Administration, the State Department for Immigration and Citizenship Services intended to…
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Ghost Payrolls and Budgeted Corruption: Are We Listening to Dr Nyakang’o?
Kenyans should rally behind Dr Nyakang’o
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Lessons from Public Participation in Nairobi County: Digital Isn’t Always Better
What does public participation in Nairobi look like? The Constitution of Kenya 2010 requires the government – whether national or county – to facilitate and engage in public participation whenever making laws. However, the form such civic undertakings take depends on who is doing it, and why. For instance, when a sitting president wants to…
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We Are Who We Are. Not Lazy. Not Unmotivated. Not Unintelligent.
I have fantasies of being enrolled in a boot camp. In them, a sadistic trainer kicks me out of bed every morning at 4 a.m., putting me through hours of such punishing physical exercise that it makes me weep. But there’s no time to cry because right afterwards I have to attend French classes with…
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The Tall Order That Is Wanjigi’s and Omtatah’s Call for Declaration of Odious Debt
Over the last many months, my two good friends, businessman and presidential aspirant Jimi Wanjigi and Busia Senator Okiya Okoiti Omtatah have variously made claims that Kenya’s domestic debt is illegal, odious and should not be repaid. This is big. Wanjigi and Omtatah argue that Kenyans should declare the domestic debt unenforceable because the debt…