Category: Business Daily

Multiple insiders familiar with the airline’s turnaround plans revealed behind-the-scenes intrigues that saw a strategic investment offer scuttled in January 2026 after interest groups demanded that the ‘field be opened to more players’.

At least four firms had expressed interest in KQ, as the airline is popularly known, with proposals including cash injections or providing airplanes in exchange for a strategic equity stake in the airline. ‘There was an investment offer around January that was about to be sealed, but some interest groups emerged and started pushing for opening doors for more parties,’ a source told Business Daily.

Sources said this tussle prompted the airline to revert to a tender system to recruit a strategic investor, further delaying the turnaround plans.

Consultancy firm KPMG was picked to prepare an investment memorandum to guide the tender, with the KQ board approving the document.

The international tender for a strategic investor is, however, yet to be floated nearly seven months after the earlier investment offer was scuttled.

KQ board chairman Kiprono Kitonny said the tender plans remain on course and denied claims of fallouts over the strategic investment following Mr Kamal’s abrupt exit.

‘We are all on the same page. We have the investor memorandum that has been done by KPMG, and now we’re in the process of appointing a transaction advisor,’ Mr Kittony told the Business Daily, adding that the open tendering process is the ideal situation since KQ is a publicly listed company.

KQ has been searching for a strategic investor for years, with the latest push coming as the airline grapples with mounting financial pressures and negative equity. The carrier posted a Sh17.2 billion net loss in 2025, reversing a Sh5.4 billion profit a year earlier, while its first-half loss widened further to Sh16.1 billion in 2026.

The plan has also evolved from a search for a single cash investor into a broader exercise that could involve different forms of capital and strategic support.

President William Ruto’s government had previously sought a strategic investor for its 48.9 percent stake in KQ. In December 2022, Dr Ruto met executives of Delta Air Lines in Washington, amid efforts to attract the US carrier as a potential strategic investor. The discussions crumbled as the carrier explored a merger with South African Airways, which also failed to materialise.

Former CEO Allan Kilavuka subsequently continued the search. In August 2024, he said KQ was close to concluding negotiations with a potential investor, although the talks did not result in an investment.

The latest capital target has grown from an initial $500 million (Sh65 billion) to roughly $1.2 billion (Sh155 billion), reflecting the scale of the airline’s balance sheet and fleet requirements. The Treasury has said the strategic investor is expected to provide capital and help strengthen the airline as the government seeks to reduce the burden of supporting the carrier.

Mr Kamal disclosed in March that KQ was already talking to at least four potential strategic investors and was open to bringing in more than one investor rather than relying on a single partner.

In an interview with NTV last week, he said interest had increased after an initial investor emerged in January.

‘Up to March, we had only one investor, and we thought that was a single source, but after that investors started to come one after the other,’ he said.

This followed the reconstitution of KQ’s board, which saw Mr Kittony appointed chairman and the addition of David Ndii, Chris Diaz and Winnie Nyamute as directors.

Mr Kamal told Business Daily that one of the investors had offered the airline airplanes in exchange for equity, while another was offering cash, and another debt that is convertible to equity. He said the airline was open to all of them.

His abrupt departure now leaves the board to oversee the next stage of a process that KQ says remains on course.

Read: Kamal pushed out of KQ after 8 months

Mr Kamal denied that his resignation was linked to the investor search.

He told the Business Daily that he was leaving because of a personal matter that required him to take a leave of absence and return home.

Its 8 a.m. on a Monday. You have barely settled at your desk when requests start pouring in. The CEO wants revised projections after a customer delays an order, the bank needs an updated cashflow forecast, and the board pack is due before lunch.

Not long ago, that meant hours rebuilding Excel models and rewriting reports. Today, an AI assistant can produce a solid first draft in minutes.

The bigger question is not productivity. It is this: if AI can perform much of the technical work, where does the real value of a finance professional lie?

The answer is higher up the value chain. For years, finance careers began with collecting data, reconciling accounts, updating spreadsheets and producing routine reports before progressing to interpretation, commercial judgment and strategic decision-making.

AI is rapidly compressing those lower-level tasks, freeing professionals to spend less time producing information and more time interpreting what it means for the business.

That shift makes human judgment more valuable, not less. AI can generate convincing answers that are inaccurate, based on flawed assumptions or unsupported conclusions. In finance, a wrong figure can influence lending, investment or board decisions. AI should accelerate analysis, but accountability must remain with people.

There is also a paradox to using AI effectively. It requires context. Professionals must explain the business, define assumptions and clarify objectives before the technology produces useful results.

That initial effort pays dividends as future analyses become faster and more relevant. This is particularly significant for Africa, where many finance teams operate with limited staff. Rather than reducing headcount, AI offers lean teams greater capacity.

Time saved on reporting and documentation can be redirected to scenario planning, working-capital management and providing better insights to leadership.

The profession will also need to rethink how young finance professionals are trained. Routine modelling and reporting have traditionally been part of learning the fundamentals. Those skills remain essential because professionals must understand the mechanics well enough to question AI-generated output.

The finance leaders of 2030 will not be valued for building spreadsheets faster.

They will be valued for asking better questions, challenging assumptions and turning numbers into sound business decisions. AI changes the tools, but judgment, context and accountability remain the profession’s greatest assets.

The State restricted commission payouts on earnings per trip in 2022 as part of a strategy to protect drivers from high fees, down from previous rates that often reached 25 percent.

At the same time, the court stopped the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) from enforcing a requirement that digital taxi platforms retain detailed passenger and driver data and hand it over to the authority.

The court found the three-year data retention and disclosure requirement unconstitutional and disproportionate, saying it amounted to continuous surveillance of customers and drivers.

She declared key parts of the NTSA (Transport Network Companies, Owners, Drivers and Passengers) Regulations, 2022, unconstitutional, but suspended the declaration for 12 calendar months to allow the government to undertake fresh public participation.

The government was ordered to conduct a formal regulatory impact assessment and align the regulations with the Constitution and enabling legislation.

The court found that the regulations were gazetted while Parliament was in recess, without waiting for them to be tabled before Parliament for scrutiny and approval.

It said enforcement began before Parliament had scrutinised and approved the regulations, denying stakeholders the constitutional safeguard of legislative oversight.

The court made the declaration while ruling on a petition filed by Bolt Operations OU in 2025 challenging the constitutionality and legality of the regulations, including the 18 percent commission cap, mandatory data retention and disclosure requirements, the regulator’s powers and alleged discrimination against digital platforms.

The commission dispute concerned how fares collected from passengers are shared between digital platforms, drivers and vehicle owners across Kenya’s digital taxi market.

Under Regulation 9, a transport network agreement must provide for a commission payable to the platform that does not exceed 18 percent of total trip earnings. It also bars terms intended to push the commission above that ceiling.

The court barred enforcement of that ceiling against the petitioner and digital transport operators during the 12-month suspension.

The 2022 rules also covered licensing, driver and vehicle standards and passenger safeguards.

The commission ceiling followed complaints from drivers about charges imposed by ride-hailing companies. The drivers protested commission rates of 25 to 30 percent and demanded an 18 percent ceiling.

Read: Uber, Bolt drivers to get powers for setting fares

The High Court found the commission restrictions unconstitutional because the Government had not demonstrated their necessity or proportionality through the required regulatory process.

‘The absence of a regulatory impact statement assessing the economic consequences of such price control, through a regulation which the Court has already found lacked the necessary constitutional safeguards, compounds the arbitrariness of the measure,’ the court said.

It found that the price-setting provisions lacked statutory foundation and economic justification, and that they ‘constitute an unconstitutional deprivation of property and contractual autonomy’.

‘There was no empirical evidence of necessity or proportionality and, therefore, the restrictions cannot be justified or considered reasonable limitations under Article 24 of the Constitution.’

In regard to privacy, the dispute concerned Regulation 17, which required ride-hailing platforms to retain detailed trip and payment information for three years and surrender it to NTSA on demand.

The records include driver and passenger identifiers, pickup and drop-off locations and times, payment methods and pricing details.

The court characterised the requirement as creating a form of continuous surveillance and found the provision unconstitutional and disproportionate.

The court said the requirement created ‘a regime of continuous surveillance.’ Regulation 17 imposed obligations on digital taxi platforms by compelling them to act as custodians of surveillance data.

‘Regulation 17 infringes the right to privacy under Article 31 of the Constitution and contravenes the principles of the Data Protection Act 2019,’ she said.

Article 31 of the Constitution guarantees every person the right to privacy, including the right not to have information relating to their family or private affairs unnecessarily required or revealed.

The Data Protection Act, 2019, gives effect to this constitutional guarantee by embedding principles of data minimisation, proportionality and consent, including informed consent.

The court said that allowing compulsory disclosure of private information on demand, in the absence of adequate safeguards and a regulatory impact statement, compounded the arbitrariness of the measure. The court declined to strike down the regulations immediately, saying doing so would remove safety standards, driver verification checks and other operational rules in the digital ride-hailing sector.

‘An immediate nullification and ceasing to operate would destabilise the transport sector,’ Justice Aburili said. ‘The appropriate remedy would be to suspend the declaration of invalidity,’ she added.

The judge said the contested provisions would cease to be enforceable after the 12 months if compliance was not achieved.

The court also considered whether the regulations encroached on transport functions assigned to county governments under the Constitution.

It found that counties retain responsibility for local transport services, including taxis and parking, while the national government oversees transport safety standards and policies that cross county boundaries.

Justice Aburili held that NTSA could license digital platforms operating across counties without taking away counties’ powers over individual vehicles, drivers, parking and local transport operations.

More than 15 computer monitors sit empty at Lillian’s cyber café on Nairobi’s Tom Mboya Street, a reminder of how technology changed a business that was once at the heart of Kenya’s digital revolution.

On a recent afternoon, only one customer is browsing at the partitioned café. Lillian, who has run the business for 20 years, is seated at an empty cubicle watching TikTok videos, while her sole assistant watches YouTube videos at the reception desk.

It is a far cry from the years when customers streamed into cyber cafes to print documents, send emails, apply for jobs, and catch up with their friends on Facebook and the now-defunct Google+.

Internet shops in Kenya boomed in the late 2000s and early 2010s in the cities and larger towns. But now, widespread use of smartphones and cheaper, faster mobile data has largely replaced the need for traditional internet browsing at these cafés.

Lillian says business has declined by about 90 percent due to the reduced need for physical computer access.

The decline has forced her to cut her staff from four to one, as power and other operating costs rise. Browsing charges, meanwhile, have remained at Sh1 per minute for years.

‘This business needs to bring in around Sh5,000 to be able to sustain itself – rent, power, internet bill, staff costs,’ she says, pointing across the empty chairs and the black network rack mounted on the wall.

‘Now, getting Sh1,000 will be a challenge at the end of the day.’

Even a day-long browsing offer of Sh300 has done little to bring customers back, she says.

The decline has also hit printing, once a major source of income for cyber cafes. With smartphones and laptops allowing users to create, store and share documents digitally, customers are increasingly questioning whether they need physical copies.

‘Printing costs are relatively high, so people are really weighing options before they have to print anything,’ she says. ‘If they can use it in softcopy format, why bother printing it at a higher cost?’

The rising cost of living has compounded the problem, making both customers and the business more cautious about spending.

‘I have to pay staff more, yet the business is not doing as well, so I am forced to lay them off and remain with just one, who I am still struggling to pay,’ says the businesswoman.

‘Furnishing this café was about Sh250,000 then. Now all these desks are here collecting dust.’

Kenya’s smartphone connections rose to 50.2 million in the three months to March, up from 48.7 million in December, marking the first time the country has crossed the 50 million smartphone threshold.

The handsets have become the primary gateway to the internet for the majority of Kenyans, with Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) data showing that 98.2 percent of Kenyan internet users between January and March 2026 accessed the net through a smartphone.

In contrast, the use of other devices such as desktop computers, laptops, and feature phones continues to decline.

On the walls of Lillian’s internet café, there are notices advertising ‘Zoom calls’ and ‘Teams meetings’. A larger enclosed cubicle at the corner has been turned into a private working space for customers who need somewhere quiet.

It is, she says, her attempt to adapt to the evolving technology. ‘That is for people who might have important calls when in town, and they want to take a work call or job interview at a quiet place within a public café.’

But even these additions have not been enough to reverse the decline. Her plans now point to an exit from the traditional cyber café model.

She plans to close the business within a year, sell the remaining monitors to second-hand goods buyers and retain only a few computers in a smaller shop offering essential services such as document printing, KRA returns, job and visa applications.

‘Farming has also come in handy; that is where my focus is now,’ she says.

For other cyber café operators, survival has meant changing the business almost entirely. In uptown Nairobi, along Muindi Mbingu Street, Fred Omondi’s shop is a glimpse into what the internet café business has evolved into.

The business still has computers, but browsing is no longer at the centre of its operations. Instead, Fred now describes it as a computer services provider, offering typesetting, basic graphic design, corporate branding materials, banner and window-sticker printing, adhesive decorations, photocopying and document printing.

Customers can also get help with tax filing, CV and cover letter formatting, job and visa applications and government services such as applying for driving licences and certificates of good conduct.

Every few minutes, a customer walks in for photocopying, another brings photos on his smartphone for colour grading and printing, while a motorcycle rider seeks adhesive decorations for his bike.

Mr Omondi employs two other people and has reduced the traditional cyber café footprint to just three computers. The rest of the shop is occupied by specialised equipment, including a photo printer, heavy-duty document printer and banner vinyl printing machine.

‘We still get customers seeking the cyber café style of browsing once in a while, but most of them are now in need of services that they cannot do at their homes from their smartphones or laptops,’ he says.

Mr Omondi says customers are also increasingly seeking technical assistance with tasks such as managing email and calendars, applying for government tenders, submitting documents and applying for jobs online.

The decline of traditional computer package training, which also boomed in the 2010s, has also left shops like his filling part of the computer literacy gap.

The introduction of the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) in 2017 has provided another source of business.

‘With parents now more involved in their children’s schoolwork, demand for printed research material and assignments has increased. That was previously mostly a reserve of the schools,’ he says.

The shop has also found a niche among small businesses in the city centre, which outsource bulk printing rather than invest in their own equipment.

The pivot has required a significant investment; Mr Omondi estimates that his equipment alone is worth almost Sh3 million, making the operation far more capital-intensive than a conventional cyber café.

However, the investment is paying off, he says. Online services and applications start at Sh500, while typing and editing cost from Sh350. Binding ranges between Sh50 and Sh150, while printing costs between Sh650 and Sh1,500 depending on the paper and size.

Logo design costs Sh7,000, while letterhead designs, business cards, and company profile design and printing cost about Sh15,000.

He says some businesses have spent as much as Sh50,000 on bulk branding materials at his shop.

The cyber café may be disappearing as a place to access the internet, says Mr Omondi, but for those willing to invest in equipment and turn their shops into service centres, the digital transformation has created new opportunities.

‘They can be reinvented as places where customers come to get things done,’ he says, ‘since there will always be tasks they cannot handle at home because of equipment needs and varying computer literacy levels.’

Nairobi’s commercial streets went quiet on August 28, 2026. Along Moi Avenue, Kenyatta Avenue and Tom Mboya Street, traders pulled down their shutters and marched to Times Tower, protesting a Customs change they say could bury small importers.

The dispute is over a single number: Sh3.2 million, the new minimum benchmark for a 40-foot container carrying consolidated goods, up from Sh2.5 million.

KRA says the Sh3.2 million benchmark is provided for under the East African Community Customs Management Act’s customs valuation framework and is not a new tax or a law passed by Parliament.

That figure had remained unchanged since the 2022/23 financial year. Since then, the shilling has weakened, freight costs have shifted and import volumes have grown. KRA argues those changes justified revisiting a three-year-old benchmark rather than leaving it untouched indefinitely.

The revised figure was due to take effect on July 1, but after pushback from traders and freight agents, implementation was delayed to August 20 to allow negotiations. It came into force regardless.

Consolidation exists to help small traders.

Several importers share one container and split shipping costs instead of paying for half-empty containers. KRA’s complaint is that the same arrangement has also become a loophole. By pooling goods into one container and clearing it under a single reference value, some importers, particularly of high-value electronics and smartphones, have underdeclared cargo, misclassified goods or concealed items to reduce duty.

Crucially, KRA insists Sh3.2 million is not a flat tax slapped on every container. It describes the minimum yield as a risk-management filter, not the actual tax liability. Containers below the benchmark qualify for simplified clearance, while traders who dispute the valuation can request individual assessment based on the actual value of their goods.

The authority also says traders are not locked into the consolidated system. They may opt out of the simplified arrangement and have containers verified on actual value, or de-consolidate cargo into individual consignments so each importer pays duty on their own goods.

None of this makes traders’ anxiety irrational. A 28 percent jump, or an extra Sh700,000 per container, hits hardest for thin-margin retailers whose business models were built around the previous threshold. De-consolidation also brings more paperwork, inspections and clearance costs.

The Small Traders Association has vowed weekly protests until KRA returns to the negotiating table. But the legal architecture is not entirely KRA’s to bargain away.

The authority may adjust the threshold, extend the grace period or refine implementation, but it maintains that containers benefiting from undervaluation cannot remain outside the customs net indefinitely.

Countries are not short of priority sectors. Across national development plans, governments routinely identify manufacturing, tourism, agriculture, digital services, pharmaceuticals and other industries as potential drivers of jobs, investment, exports and economic transformation.

Yet why do some priority sectors become engines of growth while others remain priorities on paper? The answer lies in what happens after prioritisation: whether firms can invest, produce efficiently, reach markets and grow.

The obstacles to sector growth are often similar. Tourism businesses struggle with connectivity, skills, finance and approvals.

Manufacturers point to energy, logistics, standards and access to capital. Agribusinesses confront storage, transport, certification and markets. Digital firms face skills shortages, financing gaps, connectivity constraints and uncertain regulation.

This pattern matters. Sector development is about creating the conditions and capabilities that allow firms to invest, become more productive and compete. It requires both removing the constraints that hold firms back and building what the sector needs to grow. While the precise interventions will differ by industry, successful sector transformations tend to follow a practical sequence.

First, fix the constraints that cut across sectors. Energy, transport, finance, skills, digital infrastructure, standards, trade facilitation and regulatory predictability form the common platform on which productive sectors are built. These are horizontal constraints because weaknesses in any one of them can hold back several industries at the same time.

Where the same constraint repeatedly appears across priority sectors, it should be treated as a competitiveness problem rather than addressed through separate incentives or special arrangements. If tourism, manufacturing and agribusiness are all constrained by infrastructure, skills or finance, fixing those conditions can unlock investment across several sectors at once.

Second, address sector-specific challenges. Some constraints are vertical, making it important to understand the economics and particular requirements of each sector.

Tourism illustrates this well. Natural or cultural assets do not automatically create a competitive tourism sector. Growth also depends on air connectivity, transport infrastructure, accommodation, destination development and the quality of the visitor experience alongside effective promotion.

Other sectors require different capabilities. Pharmaceuticals depend on specialised regulation, laboratories, technical skills and quality assurance.

Agribusiness may require irrigation, aggregation, cold chains and links between producers and processors. Understanding these sector economics allows governments to target the constraints that actually determine competitiveness.

Third, build an ecosystem rather than pursue isolated projects. Morocco’s automotive sector illustrates this. Its development went beyond attracting vehicle manufacturers. Industrial infrastructure, logistics, training, export access and supplier development were built around anchor investors. Over time, the ecosystem deepened and one investment helped create the conditions for another.

This is the distinction between attracting a project and building a sector. A major investment should create demand for suppliers, deepen skills, raise standards and attract complementary businesses. Without those linkages, a country may secure a factory, hotel or technology company without developing the wider industry.

Digital economies follow the same logic. Estonia’s digital success was not built on connectivity alone.

Digital identity, interoperable public systems, skills, enabling regulation and widespread adoption created an environment in which digital services and businesses could scale. The lesson is that no single intervention builds a sector. Growth comes from the way different parts of the ecosystem reinforce one another.

Fourth, diagnose the value chain before designing interventions. Broad sector labels can hide the real constraints. Manufacturing consists of very different industries. Agriculture contains distinct value chains.

Sector development requires understanding where value is created, where costs accumulate, which capabilities are missing and what prevents firms from moving into more productive activities. Policy can then address bottlenecks rather than produce another list of generic programmes.

Fifth, coordinate delivery across government. Firms experience the economy horizontally while governments tend to manage it vertically. A tourism investor may depend on transport, immigration, environment, land and investment authorities.

A manufacturer may rely on energy, customs, taxation, standards and skills institutions. Yet no single ministry controls the investor journey.

Coordination is therefore part of competitiveness. Constraints need owners, decisions need timelines and progress needs to be tracked.

Public-private dialogue matters when it produces solutions. Its value should be measured by constraints removed, not meetings held.

Sixth, measure outcomes rather than activity. Launching a strategy is an activity. Hosting an investment conference, signing memoranda and announcing incentives are activities. They may be useful, but none proves that a sector is becoming more competitive.

The outcomes that matter are whether firms are investing, productivity is improving, exports are growing, local suppliers are entering value chains, technology adoption is increasing and more productive jobs are being created.

The private sector has responsibilities too. Government can create conditions for growth. Firms ultimately build the industry. Industry associations should identify shared constraints with evidence and work with government on solutions.

Anchor firms can strengthen local value chains by developing suppliers, skills and standards. Businesses must also invest in technology, capability and productivity rather than wait for policy to do the work.

Countries should continue identifying sectors capable of driving economic transformation. But prioritisation is only the beginning. The real test of a priority sector is not that it appears in a national plan, but that firms within it can invest, become more productive and compete.

Korean food has found an audience in Kenya, if attendance at a recent kimchi-making workshop is anything to go by. But the reception was not always warm.

When Evalyne Akinyi Odhiambo first proposed to teach people how to make kimchi, a traditional Korean side dish, the idea was met with scepticism. Who would pay to spend an afternoon learning how to salt and ferment cabbage?

Ms Akinyi, however, is not a stranger to venturing where few others are willing to go, so she did not shy away from taking the gamble.

Korean food has found an audience in Kenya, if attendance at a recent kimchi-making workshop is anything to go by. But the reception was not always warm.

When Evalyne Akinyi Odhiambo first proposed to teach people how to make kimchi, a traditional Korean side dish, the idea was met with scepticism. Who would pay to spend an afternoon learning how to salt and ferment cabbage?

Ms Akinyi, however, is not a stranger to venturing where few others are willing to go, so she did not shy away from taking the gamble.

Standard Bank Group aims to firm its business grip in East Africa, taking on its South African rivals including Absa Group and Nedbank Group.

Standard Bank Chief Executive Officer, Sim Tshabalala, said that the bank aims to grow in the region by increasing internal business rather than through mergers and acquisitions.

‘Traditionally the way we have grown as a bank is that we enter markets by starting with corporate and investment banking and then developing our capabilities in business and commercial banking for the middle market and then for retail,’ he said in an interview during a visit to Nairobi.

‘In 10 years, we want to have a universal bank in East Africa, and we are going to do that whether organically or inorganically, but organic is certainly the best way to do it,’ Mr Tshabalala said.

The CEO said the regional market has growth opportunities that Standard Bank targets to exploit.

‘There is great interest in Kenya and in East Africa. As you know, our competitors, both South African and international, are here often, and that speaks to something special happening in Kenya and East Africa,’ Tshabalala said.

‘This is an economy that has been growing at about 5 percent since the early 2000s as a consequence of the fact that the economy is diversifying; it is a great logistics hub and entry point into the region, and third is that it forms part of an interesting crescent of that trade route in between Egypt, the Gulf States and the Indian Ocean’.

Mr Tshabalala’s visit to Nairobi last week was the second in 2026 and comes in the wake of two major deals by Standard Bank Group’s South African rivals, Absa Group and Nedbank Group, that have totalled Sh122.8 billion.

Absa Group is set to upsize its stake in Absa Bank Kenya from 68.5 percent to 72.0 percent in a Sh6.53 billion deal, following receipt of bids amounting to 189.4 million shares from 2,045 shareholders in its tender offer priced at Sh34.50 per share, which runs from June 30, 2026 through August 11, 2026.

Meanwhile, Nedbank secured Central Bank of Kenya approval for its Sh116.3 billion acquisition of a 66 percent stake in NCBA Group on August 28, 2026.

Amid the acquisition rush by South African banks in the Kenyan market, Mr Tshabalala maintains that Standard Group is prioritizing organic growth in the region, implying that an acquisition is not on the near-term horizon for the bank.

NCBA Bank has won the right to repossess medical equipment leased to Mediheal Hospital and Fertility Centre Ltd after the High Court in Eldoret ruled that the equipment belongs to the lender.

The court, however, found that the lender’s earlier attempt to seize the equipment in March 2024 was irregular because it had not served the hospital with the requisite notifications.

The court ruled that NCBA Leasing LLP, formerly NIC Leasing LLP, owns the equipment supplied to Mediheal under a master lease agreement dated August 9, 2018.

The hospital, founded by former Kesses MP Swarup Ranjan Mishrap, had challenged the seizure, arguing that the equipment proclaimed by Phillips International Auctioneers on March 26, 2024 belonged to Jamii Bora Leasing Limited and not NCBA.

It also claimed that the lender had acted unlawfully by attaching the equipment without a court order and without providing proper statements of account.

The court rejected the ownership claim, saying NCBA Leasing had provided extensive evidence linking it to the equipment.

‘A declaration that the 3rd Defendant, NCBA Leasing LLP (formerly NIC Leasing LLP), is the owner of the medical equipment supplied to the Plaintiff under the Master Lease Agreement dated 9th August, 2018 and the Lease Schedule,’ the court ruled.

NCBA produced its certificate of incorporation, suppliers’ invoices, delivery notes and evidence showing that it had paid for the equipment supplied by Medivision Equipment Limited, Sciencescope Limited and Meditec Systems Limited.

The court found that Mediheal had acknowledged receipt of the equipment in good order and held it as a bailee, with a contractual right to use the machines.

Mediheal had produced a 2017 offer letter from Jamii Bora Leasing Limited. However, the court said the document only established that the hospital had a separate leasing relationship with Jamii Bora and did not identify any of the equipment proclaimed in March 2024.

‘No schedule, delivery note or invoice was produced linking Jamii Bora to a single item on the proclamations,’ the court said, noting that no witness from Jamii Bora had been called to testify.

The court also found Mediheal to have been in breach of the lease agreement after failing to pay rental instalments when they fell due.

Evidence before the court showed that NCBA had issued demands for Sh13.65 million in September 2023 and Sh22.24 million in November 2023. By January 2024, the arrears had risen to Sh28.69 million, prompting the lender to issue a termination notice.

The hospital attributed its financial difficulties to government scrutiny over its kidney transplant operations in 2023, saying it had deliberately stopped admitting new patients.

The court, however, said the explanation amounted to an admission of the circumstances behind the default rather than a denial that the arrears existed.

‘I find that the Plaintiff was in breach of Clause 9.1(a), which is an essential term, and that the breach was substantial and continuing,’ the judge ruled.

Mediheal had argued that repossession could affect critically ill patients, including those on ventilators and patients undergoing kidney transplant procedures.

Despite this, the court held that NCBA was contractually entitled to recover its equipment. It said the lender could proceed with repossession, but only after complying with the proper legal and contractual procedures.

Mediheal filed the case on May 6, 2024, seeking to have the seizure declared null and void and to permanently restrain NCBA and the auctioneer from repossessing its equipment.

NCBA maintained that the lease had been lawfully terminated and that the agreement allowed it to repossess the equipment without first obtaining a court order.

The lender presented evidence showing that the parties had executed 12 lease schedules between 2018 and 2023, covering various medical machines, and that Mediheal had issued irrevocable standing instructions allowing monthly rentals to be deducted from its bank account.

A joint inspection conducted in February 2026 found that some equipment remained at the hospital and was functional. Other machines, including an ultrasound machine, X-ray machine, and surgical equipment, were reported by Mediheal as lost or stolen, although the court noted that the hospital did not provide supporting documentation.

Attend any fintech conference or read the latest report about trade financing gaps in developing economies including Kenya and you will notice that the debate is about the same wall: Micro, small and medium enterprises’ struggle to access affordable credit.

We love to point fingers at both our mainstream and alternative financial systems. We accuse commercial banks of being risk-averse, elitist, and detached from the realities of informal trade. We accuse fintechs of predatory lending.

But spend some time analysing and working within the financial ecosystem and you will come to a humbling realisation: while systemic gaps exist, the biggest bottleneck to MSME financing is not always bank rigidity or risk over pricing by fintechs. It is a deficit of institutional structure.

Available estimates indicate that only 1.56 million out of over 7.4 million Kenyan MSMEs are officially licensed or registered.

Globally, no lenders including more risk tolerant fintechs lend on grit, good intentions, or historical hustle. They lend on transparency, predictability, and risk mitigation. Until our MSMEs bridge that psychological and operational divide, any form of timely, affordable and sustainable credit will remain out of reach.

The typical Kenyan enterprise is born out of brilliant survival instincts. When an MSMEs is fighting to put food on the table, any form of governance and financial record keeping can feel like an expensive luxury.

Consequently, millions of businesses operate out of a back pocket. Revenues flow into the same mobile money account used to buy food and pay school fees. Bookkeeping lives in a physical counter book or, worse, entirely in the business owner’s head.

To an owner, this agility is strength. But to a bank’s credit manager or a fintech’s AI powered credit scoring algorithm, this looks like a big black box. With no or weak financial records and no clear legal boundary between the owner and the business, the risk is unquantifiable.

Hence when the loan application lands at the bank or fintech, it is rejected or risk priced so aggressively through short-term, expensive credit facilities that they choke the business anyway.

If we want to move from begging for micro-loans to negotiating growth capital, MSMEs must drive a deliberate culture shift towards formalising and professionalising their businesses. Professionalisation is not about renting a fancy office or rolling out the latest tech platform; it is about institutional hygiene.

First, MSMEs must stop combining personal and business funds. They should open a dedicated business account, route every single shilling through it, and adopt digital tools that generate clean, verifiable cash flow records.

Second, MSMEs must stop viewing tax and business registration and subsequent compliance as unnecessary bureaucracies.

Formalisation is their armor. It transforms their businesses from temporary hustles into legally recognisable counterparties that capital providers can legally partner with. Furthermore, tax registration enables businesses to benefit from tax deduction of expenses incurred in generation of taxable income.

Third, MSMEs must build a baseline management structure to avoid every single business decision requiring their personal thumbprint.

Doing so proves to investors that the business can survive and thrive beyond its owner.

Of course, the burden of culture shift cannot rest solely on the MSMEs navigating our ever challenging macroeconomic environment. The financial sector must continue to evolve past rigid, legacy credit appraisal models designed for businesses and individuals with regular and structured incomes.

We need more relationship-driven credit assessment, innovative productive or purpose driven financing, and embedded financial tools that meet micro-entrepreneurs where they are. Institutions like Juhudi Kilimo are already putting this into practice through asset-financing models built specifically for rural realities.

Kenya’s economic future won’t be secured by wishful thinking; it will be built by millions of MSMEs brave enough to step out of the shadows of informality. When we treat professionalization not as a bureaucratic chore, but as the master key to institutional scale, we stop chasing survival and start building legacies.