Author: David Indeje

Sub-Saharan Africa (SAA) remains the most expensive region to send diaspora remittance to, according to estimates from the latest World Bank’s Migration and Development Brief. The brief states that the cost of sending money around the world “continued to be too high,” as it averaged 6.4 per cent for a $200 transfer.  The most expensive region was sub-Saharan Africa at 8 per cent while transferring money to South Asia cost 4.6 per cent. “Data reveal that costs tend to be higher when remittances are sent through banks than through digital channels or through money transmitters offering cash-to-cash services,” the World…

Safaricom says its future maintenance and upgrades on its mobile money platform M-Pesa will drastically be reduced to remain successful by driving efficiency, ensuring reliability and improving sustainability.  This year, Safaricom has undertaken over 10 enhancements and maintenance of its systems consequently, complaints from its customers have not stopped. George Njuguna, chief information officer at Safaricom says on the M-Pesa platform, they are working on canary deployment to reduce the risk of deploying a new version that impacts the workload.  Canary deployment is the slow rollout of a new version of an existing application. “You actually can deploy a release…

Privatization of Kenya’s healthcare sector has had a negative impact leading to exclusion, draining public resources, and pushing people into poverty, according to a report from Kenyan human rights organization Hakijamii and New York University’s Center for Human Rights and Global Justice. The report says this has left the public sector ill-equipped to meet the needs of the population pushing many into poverty. “The privatization of healthcare in Kenya has led to high costs for care, failed to deliver on public health priorities, reduced access to care, and pushed people into poverty. As the role of private actors has grown,…

Land prices in Nairobi have shown strong signs of recovery, with satellite and the metropolitan areas recording 2.5 per cent and 0.3 per cent of pre-Covid levels, according to a report by Hass Consult. “The last time towns recorded similar price increases were in the third quarter of 2019 or two years ago,” says Ms Sakina Hassanali, Head of Development Consulting and Research at HassConsult. Sakina noted that in 2020, land prices in satellite towns dropped in tandem with Nairobi suburbs due to disruption to the economy and the accompanying uncertainty. The data is from an analysis of prices in…

President Uhuru Kenyatta has signed the Refugee Bill of 2019 into law. The law compels Kenya to recognise, protect and manage refugees giving into effect the 1951 United Nations Convention Relation to the Status of Refugees. The law gives effect the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees and the 1969 OAU Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa and for connected purposes. “The new Refugees Act, which had earlier been referred back to Parliament for reconsideration by the President, strengthens the management of refugees by consolidating provisions of several international legal instruments,” State House Kenya said…

KCB Group said on Wednesday its pre-tax profit for the nine months ended September doubled to Ksh 35.8 billion from Ksh 17.14 billion in the same period of last year. Its net profit rose by 131 per cent during the period attributed to income growth and reduced loan loss provision surging to Kshs. 25.2 billion compared to Kshs. 10.9 billion. “This is the strongest quarter for us since the COVID-19 pandemic struck 20 months ago, with clear signs of economic recovery across key sectors,” said KCB Group chief executive Joshua Oigara said in a statement. Key Financial Highlights Balance Sheet…