Category: Business Daily

Kenya will save $215 million (Sh27.79 billion) annually after converting its three dollar-denominated standard gauge railway (SGR) loans to yuan, with repayment in the Chinese currency set to start in January next year.

Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi on Tuesday said Kenya had already converted most of the dollar-denominated loans owed to Beijing to Chinese yuan, paving the way for the country to switch from the expensive floating, dollar-based interest rates.

There is no shortage of corporate leaders eager to talk about the future of work. The conversations are almost always filled with buzzwords-AI, automation, blockchain, digital transformation.

These discussions, while important, often expose a strange irony: many of the same organisations preaching about the workplace of tomorrow are struggling to manage the basics of the workplace today in Kenya.

Take recruitment, for example. Leaders will speak on panels about AI-powered HR tools, yet insist on receiving job applications through generic email addresses. Companies invest heavily in futuristic technology platforms, but in the same breath track how much milk and sugar their staff consume. They talk of remote work while simultaneously denying their staff time off. The disconnect is glaring. You cannot convince employees that you are ready for the work of 2030 when you are still operating with practices stuck in 1990.

Preparing for the future of work is essential, but it cannot come at the expense of the present. A thriving workforce today is the foundation for any transformation tomorrow.

Employees are asking for fairer pay, humane workloads, and real opportunities to grow. Consumers are demanding authenticity, consistency, and respect. Communities are seeking responsible corporate citizens who invest not just in profits but in people.

Technology should be an enabler, not a distraction. A company rolling out AI chatbots to serve customers while delaying salary reviews or neglecting basic wellbeing programmes will eventually face credibility issues.

The workforce notices the gap between leadership’s grand vision and their lived experience. Future readiness is critical, but if current realities are left unattended, the future will arrive on shaky foundations. The excitement about tomorrow quickly fades when today feels broken.

This is why the future of work conversation cannot remain an exclusive leadership agenda. It must be a shared vision that includes employees, customers, partners, and communities.

The future of work is not only about machines and algorithms but also about the relationships that hold organisations together. Leaders who create space for dialogue, who listen to frontline workers as much as they listen to consultants, will find their future strategies grounded in reality. The truth is, no one doubts the potential of AI and emerging technologies. They will reshape industries in ways we are only beginning to understand. But focusing only on what’s coming risks alienating the very people expected to make that transition a success.

Employees need to see that leaders can balance innovation with empathy, progress with fairness, and vision with practicality. A company that builds tomorrow while ignoring the needs of the present risks creating a glossy vision that collapses under the weight of unhappy employees and disillusioned stakeholders.

The future of work should excite us. But it should not blind us to the realities of today. A forward-looking strategy means nothing if the present workplace is broken. The future of work is not just an agenda for the boardroom.

It is a lived reality for the people inside and around the organisation. Technology will play its part, but humanity will remain the heart of work.

Companies must invest in the tools of tomorrow while ensuring the people of today are thriving. That balance-between future ambition and current responsibility-is what will define whether workplace transformation truly takes root.

The desperate cross-border flight of Burundians seeking asylum in Kenya scarcely registered as a warning sign for most Kenyan companies operating in the tiny, landlocked nation.

So, even as they crossed into Kenya in droves to seek refuge-later turning up on Nairobi’s streets peddling peanuts and second-hand shoes-it remained business as usual for Kenyan firms in Burundi, ranked by the World Bank as the world’s poorest country.

Democracy is a framework that competitively allocates political power from the citizens to the representative government and ensures the convergence of the interests of the citizens and their representatives.

In a democracy, the sovereign power belongs to the citizens who may exercise it directly or indirectly through elective representation. As principals, the citizens delegate some of their sovereign power to the three arms of the government to maximise their welfare collectively.

Effective political power delegation is exercised through competitive electoral processes, which rests on the assumption that the citizens possess public virtues and credible information to uphold accountability to their elected representatives. The whirlwind of digital revolution has irretrievably transformed the power dynamics between the states and citizens, as evidenced by the 2024 worldwide elections data.

The digital revolution is attributed to the defeat of many incumbents in the polls of 70 countries, home to half of the world’s population. However, the digital revolution seemingly cuts both ways; it can be progressive as well as retrogressive.

On one hand, digital democracy embodies the development of digital systems, communication and rapid advances in computing power, which have enabled new ways of generating, processing and sharing information.

On the face of it, these developments would inferably enable the citizens to progressively and effectively exercise their core civil duty of voting in the government of their choice.

On the other hand, digital systems like the Internet, once hailed in its infancy as a beacon of unbounded freedom on a new electronic frontier, have gradually mutated to become manipulative through misinformation.

For instance, the algorithms that drive digital media reinforce the monopolistic dominance of service providers, whose unaccountable power not only determines what choices users have but also gathers data on them and shapes their perceptions.

Conversely, the explosion of the digital revolution in the Global North has coincided with a backsliding of democracy in Africa, which epitomises the global digital divide.

Yet, as an emerging digital hub in Africa, Kenya has embraced digital democracy through a digitalisation policy anchored on digital infrastructure, services, data management, skills, and innovation.

These progressive endeavours, nevertheless, must be safeguarded against the downside of the digital revolution.

For instance, the consequential emergence of Artificial Intelligences (AI) technology and its impact on the electoral process. AI has become a double-edged sword that can enhance digital democracy or undermine it.

Kenya has taken is cognizant of these threats by taking policy and legislative actions embodied on Kenya’s AI Strategy 2025-2030 and the Data Protection Act of 2019, which are anchored on constitutional principle of right to information.

However, given the exponential fluidity of AI technology, more is needed to combat the prevalence of digital disinformation in the electoral process.

A tribunal has dismissed a Sh18 billion claim by 600 Telkom Kenya retirees, ending a 16-year dispute over pensions paid to them.

Since 2009, the pensioners have been battling Telposta Pension Scheme, the pension administrator for former Telkom workers, accusing it of miscalculating their pensions and underpaying them.

What will tomorrow’s workforce learn about your organisation? Imagine a new recruit in 2045 opening a box that tells them who you were, what you valued, and how it felt to work in your company. That is what a time capsule can do.

It brings people together in the present while sending a message forward in time.

Supermarket chain operator Naivas Limited has appointed a non-family CEO for the first time in its 35-year history, marking a shift in leadership for Kenya’s largest retailer that has been opening up to outsiders through stake sales.

The retailer, which last week hit 110 stores with a new outlet at Nairobi’s Gachie Westbay Mall, announced Tuesday that its co-founder and managing director David Kimani, will be stepping down from his role at the end of this month.

Kenyans received stablecoins worth Sh426 billion ($3.3 billion) in 12 months to June 2024 revealing a growing appeal for the cash-backed cryptocurrencies in day-to-day local transactions.

This largely quiet entry of stablecoins to the mainstream has raised interest among not just banks and other payment providers but also businesses and individuals.

A Ugandan importer has sued a Mombasa-based bulk grain handling company, Bulkstream Ltd, demanding unconditional release of its cargo comprising 1,514 tonnes of wheat imported from Ukraine.

Pan Afric Commodities Ltd says it purchased approximately 2,837 tonnes of wheat, which was shipped to the port of Mombasa under a charter party agreement and was subject to a Bill of Lading, which was issued on September 21, 2018.

More than 190 motor vehicle owners have been allowed to demand millions of shillings from the government for blunders that protected United Insurance Company from settling claims arising from accidents after the insurer’s collapse in 2005.

In a precedent-setting decision that could expose taxpayers to major losses, the Court of Appeal said the government was responsible for the losses suffered by policyholders over the delay in implementing the Policyholders Compensation Fund in 2005.