Global Voices Post on Facebook, Kingpin Act and Harun Mwau

Facebook Should Unfriend John Mwau ( This a Re print of a post published by the author at GlobalVoices)

A Kenyan blogger Daudi Were has raised an interesting question about whether the U.S. government will be willing to enforce the Kingpin Act against Facebook for apparently doing business with a Kenyan national John Harun Mwau who had earlier this year been designated as a drug lord under the Kingpin Act (See White House Press Release).
The Kingpin Act denies significant foreign narcotics traffickers, their related businesses, and their operatives access to the U.S. financial system and prohibits all trade and transactions between the traffickers and U.S. companies and individuals.
Daudi makes some interesting observations in his post titled “Facebook Should Unfriend Mwau”:

In other words Kingpin Act targets, on a worldwide basis, significant foreign narcotics traffickers, their organizations, and operatives by making it illegal for any U.S. company or any U.S. individual to conduct any financial transactions with them.

Daudi further elaborates:

Facebook is a social networking service and website operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. Facebook, Inc was founded in 2004 and is based in Palo Alto, California. It is a U.S. company. Ownership of Facebook, Inc is shared between Mark Zuckerberg, Accel Partners, Digital Sky Technologies, Greylock Partners, Meritech Capital Partners and Microsoft amongst others. Most are U.S. citizens and U.S. companies.
Remember that U.S. companies and U.S. individuals are forbidden from any financial transactions with narcotics traffickers named through the Kingpin Act. The fines for ignoring the Act range from USD 1 million to USD 10 million and there’s also the not very little matter of the possibility of 30 years imprisonment.
Last night I started noticing adverts on Facebook for John Harun Mwau’s Facebook page. The text for the ad reads:The text for the ad reads:

Success and Wealth are but a state of mind. Discover the principles that guided me to Success on My Facebook Page.

These ads are typical paid for, they usually involve some sort of financial transaction. The type of transaction the Kingpin Act forbids.

He then makes a significant question that begs an answer from Facebook:

The world is a village. You never know when a “significant narcotics trafficker” is going to buy ads on your service. The real question here perhaps is what will these U.S. companies, such as Facebook and Microsoft, do when they find out individuals they are not allowed to do business with are buying their services?

Jke  of KikuyuMoja blog leaves a comment on the post stating:

FB & Mwau: hahahaha, good point! I’d like to see someone from the Embassy reply on this one. Or maybe they will argue that the ads weren’t bought by Mwau but instead by his supporters (which isn’t the same, ama?).

Daudi responds:

@JKE – the act targets traffickers, their related businesses, and their operatives. So friends, friends of friends, supporters etc all count in my book!

The naming of John Harun Mwau as a drug Kingpin back in June created a lot of buzz online.
Reacting to the news at the time, Kenyan Jurist wrote:

The Kingpin designation essentially makes Mwau a pariah and any financial relationship with him becomes toxic particularly when it falls within the jurisdiction of the US. This in essence applies to any foreign transaction, where money may be routed through the US. It is also a warning to the Government of Kenya to take the problem of drug trafficking seriously.

Kenyan Stockholm blog published the letter from Barack Obama on the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act, which drew 21 comments.
Following alleged attack on Mwau's vehicle, blogger Wesley Rants wrote:

Then this allusion that Obama is after his personal wealth and consequently the boss’s life is in danger is clutching at straws literally, really?
As for the demand that government accords him extra security, didn’t I just read that there was a driver and a bodyguard in the car? Don’t all Mps have a bodyguard provided at our expense?
Maybe our local bosses can borrow a leaf from Mexico where bosses are building their own battle tanks:

Is the Kingpin Act just a public relations stunt? Kenyans are eager to see what will be the official response to the question raised by Daudi Were.

2011 KENYA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

OVER 250 FILMS RECEIVED FOR 2011 KENYA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

Call for Film Entries to Close in Two Weeks

Nairobi July 28, 2011: Filmmakers who want to participate in this year’s Kenya International Film Festival have now up to August 14 to submit their entries. The festival, set for October 21 to October 31 has so far received 250 entries.

The Kenya International Film Festivals commonly known as KIFF is inviting film makers to send in their films for various categories such as Long Features, Documentaries, Short Features, Animation, Student Films and Experimental Films to be featured at this year’s event.

The KIFF will award winners in all the categories as well as Best East Africa film, Jury Award, Best actor and Best actress. The organization is holding its sixth annual festival since its inception. The festival is a unique array of 10 days that showcases best film entries from all over the world in various towns and countries.

In 2010 the film festivals saw 5 out of the 10 awards go to Kenyan films. They included Gill Wilsons ‘Why Now’, Jeff Mohamed’s ‘One Goal, One Hope’ and Best East African Film went to Hawa Essuman’s ‘Soul Boy’. Other awards went to film makers from Ethiopia and Belgium.

The year’s theme is ‘Leadership – Next Generation’.

According to the Festival director Mr. Charles Asiba the theme was developed in line with Africa’s mood, the changes in the continent and its need for good and accountable leadership.

“Do you know for example, all four presidents in Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi and Kenya are facing an election in the next 12 months? These are challenging times for many African countries and we want to give African’s an opportunity to tell the world and to express what their thoughts on leadership are”, said Mr. Asiba while speaking during an interview.

This year the Film Festivals screenings will be held simultaneously in various towns including Nairobi, Nakuru, Kisumu, Mombasa, and Eldoret. Mr. Asiba expressed his satisfaction in the growth of Kenyan film sector saying that there will be many Kenya films to be aired during the festival week.

Mr Asiba said “We are so far impressed by the levels of professionalism and record number of 250 entries that have come in so far. Our target was 365 films but we are not complaining”.

Filmmakers are encouraged to send their DVDs and cassettes to the KIFF either by registered mail or drop them at KIFF offices.

Pfizer Nutrition Launches in Kenya

High levels of obesity combined with high levels of malnutrition evident among children in Kenya

Nairobi, Kenya – July, 28^th, 2011: Following the launch of Pfizer Distributive hub in Kenya to serve the East African region, Pfizer Nutrition has announced the launch of its advanced product portfolio in Nairobi, Kenya. The launch is in line with Pfizer’s global mission to improve health and well-being at every stage in life, bringing breadth and depth of consumer and scientific insight to new populations and markets around the world.

“We are very excited about our entry into the Kenyan market, and we thank all our local partners for their support and faith in Pfizer Nutrition. Kenya is very different to any other market. Here, we see two extremes in the child nutrition spectrum; we have high levels of obesity combined with high levels of malnutrition. It is part of our social responsibility to try and help minimize these gaps and meet the needs of the community,” said Dr. Mohamed Abdel Khalek, Medical Director, Pfizer Nutrition, Africa & Middle East. “For almost 100 years, Pfizer Nutrition has leveraged clinical rigor, scientific research, world class manufacturing and product safety standards to drive innovative solutions that meet the specific needs of the child nutrition field in every market.”

In a recent study published by Constance A Gewa, Department of Global & Community Health, College of Health & Human Services, George Mason University, USA, out of 1,495 children between the ages of three and five years in Kenya, 30% were stunted, 16% were underweight and 22% were overweight or obese1. The analysis demonstrates the presence of under and over-nutrition among Kenyan pre-school children and the importance of focusing on expanding efforts to prevent and treat malnutrition within this population.

Dr. Fred Were, Pediatrician & Specialist in Neonatal Medicine & National Chairman, Kenya Pediatric Association, commented: “We all know that as a country becomes more industrialized and westernized the level of obesity or over-nutrition increases while the level of malnutrition decreases. In Kenya, this trend is very different, obesity is becoming very visible in urbanized areas such as Nairobi, but malnutrition is not decreasing in the rural communities or even in the low income areas of Nairobi. We have to address these two extremes immediately.”

In a direct effort to support the growing concerns of the Kenyan child nutrition market, Pfizer Nutrition has made available its new advanced Gold line of child formulations in Kenya. The new GOLD range has been specially developed to meet the changing feeding needs of young children.

Pfizer Nutrition’s GOLD range is a comprehensive series of nutritious infant formulas, follow-on formulas and growing-up milks designed to reflect the latest recommendations from leading nutritional experts and contains the Biofactors System which are the nutritional components that deliver functional benefits and play a positive and or integrative role that help support the child’s health, growth and development.  

Breast milk is best for healthy growth and development, but when that option is not possible, Pfizer Nutrition is committed to developing infant formula that helps formula-fed babies grow and develop to their full potential.

“Now that we are here in Kenya, one of our main priorities is aimed at developing local public health partnerships to strengthen connections within the pediatric nutrition community and  increase information sharing and develop a supportive network to accurately deal with the local challenges Kenya is facing in the child nutrition field,” concluded Dr. Abdel Khalek.

Emirates to launches A380 to Rome

 Nairobi- 27th July 2011 – Emirates, one of the fastest growing airlines in the world, has announced the historic capital city of Rome as the next destinations slated for its flagship A380 aircraft. The daily A380 services will start 1st December 2011.

The announcement of Emirates’ first permanent scheduled A380 service to Italy comes on the back of its momentous June 6th landing at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci airport to mark the celebrations for its 50th anniversary, while commemorating 150 years of Italian unification.

Making the announcement in Nairobi, Emirates’ Regional Manager for East Africa Essa Sulaiman Ahmad said the launch of Emirates A380 service to Italy will improve economic ties between Kenya and Italy

“In addition to underscores our commitment to Italy, the permanent service of the Emirates’ A380 to Rome, will improve trade and between Nairobi and Rome. The new A380 service improves the capacity in terms of passengers and cargo loads and enhances connectivity between the two cities,” said Mr Ahmad.


Currently, there exists a trade gap deficit between Kenya and Italy, hugely in favour of the later. According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics, Kenya’s imports from Italy amounted to Kesh13.88 in 2009 against Ksh2.4 billion worth of exports to Italy during the same period.


“Rome is currently served twice daily by Emirates. Coupled with a double daily service to Milan and a daily flight to Venice, our weekly flights to Italy now stand at 35. This is brings convenience to both businessmen wishing to trade with Italy or leisure travelers and pilgrims visiting Italy,” Mr Ahmad said.

The A380 service will operate daily as EK 97, departing Dubai at 0910hrs (local time) and arriving at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci airport at 1235hrs (local). The return flight, EK 98, departs Rome at 1435hrs (local) and arrives in Dubai at 2305hrs (local). The arrival time of the A380 in Dubai will allow passengers from Italy to connect to its extensive network of destinations in the Far East.

With 15 A380s currently in its fleet, Emirates is the largest operator of the environmentally friendly double-decker aircraft, operating services from Dubai to London Heathrow (double-daily), Manchester, Paris Charles de Gaulle, Toronto, Seoul, Bangkok, Beijing, Shanghai, Jeddah, New York, Hong Kong, Sydney and Auckland.

From 1st October 2011, the A380 will begin serving Johannesburg, followed by Kuala Lumpur as of 1st December and then from 1st January 2012, the A380 will be deployed on the Munich route.

So far in 2011, Emirates has launched passenger flights to Basra and Geneva. Services to Copenhagen will commence on 1st August and St Petersburg will be launched on 1st November, followed by Baghdad on 13th November, and Rio and Buenos Aires in January 2012.

Amnesty TV Channel On YouTube

Human Rights enthusiast and like minded persons will be pleased to know that Amnesty online has launched Amnesty TV a video magazine show that mixes satirical comedy, campaign stunts, short documentaries, outspoken opinion and real news on YouTube. The show will be produced on fortnightly basis with a 15 minutes programmes.
Amnesty TV at url  http://www.youtube.com/amnestytv is being launched today with  the first of the fortnightly 15 minute programmes being aired.The first program will feature the human rights stories of the day, using big names, mischief and satire. This week, there will be some recreations of the horrendously violent techniques sactioned for security guards to use in removals, a message from Aung San Suu Kyi, a segment on freedom of information from Wikipedia cofounder Jimmy Wales, and an attempt to persuade the ambassadors from countries such as Saudi Arabia, China and North Korea to sign Amnesty Internationals 50th birthday card.

Quite some interesting development , i must say!

Emirates' in-flight entertainment named as world's best

Emirates ice system wins Skytrax Award for the seventh year


July, 12 2011 – For the seventh year in a row, Emirates Airline’s ‘ice’ inflight entertainment system has been awarded the ‘World's Best Airline Inflight Entertainment’ award at the 2011 Skytrax World Airline Awards. The awards are based on voting by over 18.8 million airline passengers from 100 different nationalities.

Inflight Entertainment (IFE) has become a key competitive benchmark for airlines worldwide. Emirates has maintained its industry-leading position by continuously investing in and expanding its entertainment offering; resulting in an incredible range of movies, television and music from around the world.

Emirates latest IFE system, ice Digital Widescreen (‘ice’ stands for information, communications and entertainment), offers a staggering choice of over 1200 channels of entertainment, including over 280 movies from around the world, hundreds of TV choices and thousands of music tracks from contemporary to classical.

As well as investing in the latest entertainment content and newest systems, Emirates has recently finished upgrading the hardware on its existing A330-200 and A340-300 fleets to a new digital IFE system; bringing ice to every seat in Emirates First Class and Emirates Business Class - a considerable investment in equipment at time when many airlines are easing back on significant product improvements. Furthermore, Emirates now has over 90 aircraft equipped with AeroMobile, which allows mobile phone use inflight, and will soon roll out A380 aircraft equipped with WiFi internet connection.

“As a global airline serving 113 destinations on five continents, our passengers are as diverse and unique as our routes. Emirates strives to make our service the most comfortable and entertaining in the world. This year’s Skytrax ‘World's Best Airline Inflight Entertainment’ award once again underlines our relentless commitment to providing the best inflight entertainment in the air – offering more content, in more languages and ultimately more choice, than ever before,” said Patrick Brannelly, Emirates’ Vice President Corporate Communications Product.

“We are proud to have our efforts recognized once again and we can assure our passengers that we won’t be resting on our laurels at all; we’ll be working harder than ever to make sure that our passengers continue to have the best entertainment experience in the air.”

"Emirates seems to have a very firm grip on this title, having been named the winner of world's Best Airline Inflight Entertainment Award for many successive years," said Edward Plaisted, CEO of Skytrax. "With the increased level of competition amongst airlines to deliver the best standards of inflight entertainment, it is an even greater achievement for Emirates that they can stay at the No 1 spot again in 2011."


A great example of what passengers can experience from inflight entertainment on Emirates is the incredible August line-up; featuring 50 newly-acquired movies from Hollywood, Bollywood and beyond. Emirates will be the first airline showing of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which complements an extensive film library available on ice.

Families travelling with children will be spoilt for choice in August as ice will offer over 25 kids movies; including up to 18 Disney Classics and 10 new release movies for younger viewers. Children can also enjoy up to 30 hours of TV programmes ranging from pre-school favourites, the Wiggles, to BBC Cbeebies sensation Rastamouse and Cartoon Network hits.

Emirates' award-winning ice system provides more than 1200 channels on-demand, with a wide selection of entertainment for children and adults.

British American IPO(Kenya) Starts Today

The British American Investment Company limited will be going to the market today (Tuesday July 12th 2011) to raise Ksh5.58 billion through issuance of 650 million new ordinary shares at sh9 (nine) per share.

Addressing members of the Association of Kenya Insurers British American Investment Company Chairman Nicholas Ashford- Hodges said the fund raised would be used to boost the company’s operations in Kenya and to expand to the regional markets.

“This IPO will give British-American an opportunity to increase the scope of its operations and widen its footprint. Having recently opened operations in Uganda, the company’s strategic intent is to spread its wings even further to the rest of Eastern Africa and the next step will be to open offices in Tanzania, Rwanda and Southern Sudan,” said Mr Ashford- Hodges.

The British American Investment Company Limited Group Managing Director Benson Wairegi said that in addition to regional expansion, the company is also keen to take advantage of emerging opportunities through innovative products and distribution channels such as microinsurance and bancassurance.


“We seek to fundamentally redefine the scale and scope of the insurance sector in Kenya and the wider region. We will tap the economic potential nascent in the newly created counties by building on our core distribution strengths, in particular our sales force presently one thousand strong and intended to be expanded considerably further. Our established model of scale, reach and multi-layered selling will also be extended to the retail market and SMEs in the wider geographical region,” said Wairegi.



Mr. Wairegi continued: “We believe the offer price of Ksh9 is affordable and will appeal to many investors. Whilst the Group is already over 60% owned by Kenyan investors, this IPO will reinforce its position as a truly Kenyan financial institution. I therefore invite you to join us as a shareholder of this great company.”


The offer which will be officially launch by the Prime Minister Raila Odinga today at the Norfolk Hotel closes on August 5th.


The offer will be opened to the east African retail investors for whom 30% of the shares have been allocated. Foreign investors have also been allocated 30% of the shares with 37% reserved for institutional investors. The remaining 3% has been reserved for Employee, Agents and Individual Life Policy Holders.

Nokia's new business-to-business Care Center

Nokia invests in new business-to-business Care Centre as demand for services grows

Nairobi Kenya, July 5 2011: Nokia, the world’s leading mobile phone manufacturer and solutions provider, today launched a state-of-the art care centre aimed at offering efficient services and support for its business partners and VIP customers who rely heavily on Nokia phones and services in meeting their business objectives.

The care centre will enable business partners to drop off their customer phones for service within a shorter period of time therefore facilitating business continuity in their operations. During this time the customers will have courtesy high-end Nokia phones to use. The care centre is located at Remax Plaza on Argwings Kodhek Road, Nairobi.

Mr Kenneth Oyolla, GM for East and Southern Africa, Nokia, said the new care centre was a response to new demand in services from Nokia customers in Kenya who will now receive faster support expected to last for a maximum of three days.

“We believe that this new investment will go a long way in boosting our customers’ businesses as they need to be connected to their clients all the time for our business partners, corporate and VIP customers. Business continuity is a key element in of customer support and we believe this new facility will bring a new range experience to our customers,” said Mr. Oyolla.

He added: “Our business has grown tremendously especially in the market segment which will be served by this care centre and this means that the demand for services for these customers have increased over time. We will continue to listen to our customers’ feedback and respond with solutions that can help drive growth for both Nokia and its loyal customers.”

Nokia currently operates the world’s largest voluntary mobile device recycling scheme with drop-off points in over 5000 Nokia Care Points around the world. The Remax Plaza store is the most recent addition to this list and customers will also enjoy free Wi-Fi and refreshments in a VIP lounge as they wait for their phones to be repaired.

The new Care Centre offers a holistic solution to consumers providing not only repair assistance, but also support for Nokia services including the Ovi Store, Nokia Messaging and Nokia Mail for Exchange among other services.

Ms Brenda Okwiri, Nokia’s Head of Care for East and Southern Africa, said the facility will have a capacity of up to eight technicians, at the beginning, looking at various elements of support to repair phones.

“We are so far offering care support in Nairobi, Mombasa and Kisumu and we plan to have several collection points coming up through the retail network,” said Ms Okwiri.

Since 2006, Nokia Care through its partners have been providing a wide range of Services and Service Programs supporting Nokia´s product lines to meet the requirements of all Nokia Customers. These services vary from in-warranty repair services, out-of-warranty repair services, swaps and upgrades and software supports, setup and installation.

Nokia Care Centres are equipped to manage all repairs and faults and are manned by qualified personnel trained quarterly to ensure quality timely repairs and that care is taken when handling customer’s phones.

ENABLIS BUSINESS LAUNCH COMPETITION

CHASE BANK ENABLIS ILO BUSINESS LAUNCHPAD TO AWARD BEST BUSINESS PLANS IN NATIONAL COMPETITION

Have a business idea, but don’t know how to execute it? Help is on the way.

The Enablis Entrepreneurial Network East Africa, Chase Bank and the International Labour Organization have today launched the 2011 annual business plan competition aimed at supporting emerging and existing entrepreneurs. The competition will run between July and October 2011.

The competition is a platform for Kenyans with business ideas to realize their dreams. To enter the competition aspiring entrepreneurs have to put their ideas onto paper by preparing a business plan and submitting to the Chase Bank Enablis ILO Business Launchpad. However, for those who may not know how to write a business plan, the competition’s training partner Inoorero University will conduct a series of awareness and training sessions in 20 counties across the country.

“We will visit 20 counties across the country in July and August to offer free training on how to write fundable business plans and also give tips on how to approach a bank for a business loan,” said Mr. Moses Mwaura, Chief Operations Officer, Enablis Africa.

The competition will roll out in four phases, starting with the launch. After the official launch, any Kenyan citizen over the age of 18 is eligible to participate and the competition will accept submissions from both start-ups and expanding businesses.

The awareness and training sessions will be the second phase of the competition. The competition will stop receiving business plans on 31 August 2011 after which the entries will be evaluated, scored, and ranked. The Enablis 100 finalists will be announced on 5 October 2011. The finalists will be invited to Nairobi for further training and judging which will culminate with a winner’s gala where the 2011 winners will be unveiled.

A total of KSH 3.5 million will be awarded to winners in the seven categories which include: Media, marketing and communication, Information and communication technology, Agri-business and agri-processing, Manufacturing and construction, Arts, sports, logistics, tourism and recreation, Business and professional services, and Green and ecological businesses.

The Enablis finalists will also be entitled to Chase Bank accounts, and free Enablis membership for a year. Selected finalists will also benefit from business development support from ILO’s Youth Entrepreneurship Facility.

The 2011 competition got a boost when the ILO’s Youth Entrepreneurship Facility increased their sponsorship to share the title sponsorship with Chase Bank. The competition is also supported by Inoorero University, Business Daily, Safaricom Foundation, MobiKash, Rhino Special Products and the Kenya ICT Board. Mr. Mwaura called for every Kenyan with a business idea to believe in their ideas and submit their business plan.

Speaking at the launch, Mr. Parmain ole Narikae, General Manager of Chase Bank said “Chase Bank is delighted to once more become part of transforming the lives of entrepreneurs in Kenya. Through the competition last year, we were able to interact and learn at a most intimate level the requirements of SMEs. These insights have been weaved into our product development process to ensure that entrepreneurs get the services and products they seek. We are especially keen on developing young talent in the vibrant SME sector as they will positively boost Kenya’s Economy in the future,”

Mr. Jens Dyring Christensen, the Chief Technical Advisor of ILO’s Youth Entrepreneurship Facility while speaking at the launch ceremony said “The ILO is excited by the partnership with Chase Bank and Enablis in the 2011 Business Launchpad. We have high hopes for green and social enterprise business plans and are ready to support winners. We want young entrepreneurs to integrate the concept of sustainable enterprise in their operations and establish firms that create decent jobs that integrate green and social benefits in addition to purely economic benefits,” Mr. Christensen pointed out that there was a lot of talent in Kenya and investing in these talents will help contribute to Kenya’s socio-economic growth.

Corruption at Ardhi House/Ministry Of Lands

Nothing justifies the delaying in endorsing a Change of User on a Title for 10 years! Yet that has been the case that i have personally witnessed while trying to process a change of User for a prime plot in parklands from residential into commercial(i mean this is a process that potential investors would want done in the list bit of time in order to initiate development on a piece of land yet at the lands office it seems to be a favor ) .The actual process after City Council approvals began in 2001. I joined my present employer in 2005 and since then i have been pushing for the endorsement of change of user and trust me the file has been dissapearing and re-appearing several times.I have actually placed one clerk to the issue, compelled our advocate's firm to formally complain on several occasions but yet there has been no headway!

This is just but one example of what thousands of Kenyans are going through on a daily basis due to an inept and corrupt department at the lands office.The problem is that sufficient attention is not being placed to this vice at the Lands Registry. Anti Corruption sleuths visit the lands registry infrequently often when a "higher power's" work has been hindered then dissappear with little or no effect to the corruption cartels.

I heard the Permanent Secretary in the lands ministry speak of the efforts they are putting in place to stem the malignant and systemic corruption at the lands office but i believe these efforts are lacklustre and simply lilliputian. I mean what can be more effective than sending some of this inept staff home-the records bear witness where some of this work stalls. Searches take months if not years in certain instances.It is very possible to trace who is not working at the lands office. In fact a trip there in the rescent past confirmed that there are Civil servants who come in the morning ,leave their coats on the chair and vamoose to their private concerns.This is especially so in the customer care counter and the banking hall, leaving you to wonder why is it there in the first place.

My take is that Kenya's Netizens should take up the challenge to fight corruption by highlighting incidences and events whereby public officials have simply been lacksaidical in performing their duties or outrightly solicited for bribes.We must not leave the status quo to prevail or aid and abet the practice of corruption.We have clearly seen how Social Media has been used to effect Social Change in Africa therefore stand up against corruption.Mulika those errant officials who do not want to change with the times.

If you are on twitter and believe that you will no longer stomach corruption at the lands ministry please use the handle #CorruptionArdhiHse to voice and aggregate your concern(please re tweet, Facebook... etc ensure you create a buzz ).We must simply not allow this to continue un abated.It is for your greater good that if you read this you do something about it.Do not underestimate the social media front.Engage your legislator online about this.Its not just business as usual.


Kenya Anti Corruption Authority & Social Media:
Thumbs down to Kenya Anti Corruption Commission- in this day and age you dont have a Social Media contact i.e Facebook, Twitter ...etc nor are your top officials available on these mediums whereas the majority of Kenyans are using these platforms to share their concerns.Where is the E-Governance strategy and policy headed......shame on you.

KACC PLO Lumumba follow the Chief Justice 's Willy Mutunga's lead and get a Twitter Address! 

Cisco Expo Kenya 2011-Review

The Cisco Africa event dubbed "Collaboration and Virtualization Beyond Borders" held at the Kenyatta International Conference Centre in Nairobi was a huge success with soaring attendance levels.
 Speaker after speaker demonstrated  their in-depth knowledge and expertise especially in relation to Cisco products as the Worlds leading networking solutions provider.

Some of the facts that were revealed that i found  particularly impressive is that  many gadgets being used by us in everyday work are increasingly  getting networked through ubiquitous Internet protocols.It is expected that in the next three years there will be 50 billion devices with each person on earth having an average of 7 devices.At current there are 35 billion devices in the market.It was also stated that by 2015 there will be over 265 Million Mobile Broadband subscriptions in Africa.With the increased submarine fibre optic connection ,connectivity will be optimum for use of such devices driving opportunities in the vertical market.

Dan Smoot Vice President Cisco Capital – Worldwide Sales indicated that an audit of the various IP 's in his household revealed around 70.That i presume may be just a typical household out there in the USA making use of I-Pads, I -Phones, Digital Tv's ,Cars ...etcs each having ubiquitous IP addresses.

The World is ecoming increasingly networked and seeing that Cisco shipped many of its experts from various Countries to Kenya for this event and to expound on this trends in networking perhaps reveals the potential that Africa has in emerging opportunities being created by ICT.This is especially so seeing that use of Internet enabled handsets and devices has increased wholesomely within the continent in the recent past and projections are that the curve will remain exponential.

Fadi Salloum With Blogger Martin Gicheru of TechWeez

Attending the conference gave me the opportunity to meet the man who was behind the Social Media
marketing of the event Mr Fadi Salloum -The  Cisco Digital Marketing Program Manager Africa Levant-resident in Beirut. I must say he did a good job and actively engaged Kenya's social media Icons, bloggers...etc to create an online buzz on the event. Fadi deserves a pat on the back -GOOD JOB!What was particurlarly impressive is that he actually did not use a PR firm as such but just using the net he was able to pick the right influencers to pitch on the event.

Tweeps on Twitter covered the event live with photos, blog posts,Facebook Page  twitter updates under the tag #CE11KE which were being beamed on several large screen TV's

The live holographic telepresence demo was a highlight of the event- indeed video calls and virtual meetings are the in things in ICT presently and bound to catch up in emerging economies.By all means the event was truly engaging and enlightening, for further information you can read the timeline @CiscoAfrica