Author: David Indeje

The cost of living in Kenya eased slightly in May to 5.49% compared to 6.58% in April on account of favourable weather conditions which resulted in lower food prices. “The food and non-alcoholic drinks index decreased by 0.3% in May mainly due to favourable weather conditions which led to lower prices for some commodities,” the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics Director General Zachary Mwangi said in a statement on Friday. However,  housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels index increased by 0.61 percentage points due to the higher cost of rent and cooking fuels. On Monday, the Central Bank of…

Uganda Airlines is set to launch its maiden flight between Nairobi and Entebbe stirring up rivalry for the route with Kenya Airways low-cost carrier JamboJet. “Ready to fly with us on our maiden flights? Well, pack your bags Uganda; for we are heading to Nairobi,” it tweeted on Friday. https://twitter.com/UG_Airlines/status/1134382645691998210 In April, the country received two Bombardier CRJ900 jets (5x-KOB and 5x-EQU) as part of its plan to revive national carrier Uganda Airlines, which was grounded almost two decades ago. https://twitter.com/UG_Airlines/status/1148483061912428544 In 2018, Jambojet launched a double daily flight between Nairobi and Entebbe. Jambojet operates double daily flights with departures…

South Africa became third on the African continent that has an equal number of female and male ministers in its government. President Cyril Ramaphosa announced his new Cabinet, downsizing it from 36 to 28 the number of ministers. Half the new ministers are women, making South Africa one of the world’s few gender-balanced governments. “For the first time in the history of our country, half of all the ministers are women,” Ramaphosa said. The rainbow nation joins Ethiopia’s Abiy Ahmed and Rwanda’s Paul Kagame who have taken similar actions. Moussa Faki Mahamat, Chairperson of the African Union Commission congratulated President…

The COMESA Business Council signed a  USD 1.5 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to offer technical support to Small and Medium Enterprises through a digital financial platform. The grant which is spread across two years -2019/2020 will be implemented in partnership with the Kenya Association of Manufacturers. The Project will support the design, development, and deployment of a low-cost, interoperable and fraud-resistant integrated digital financial services for SMEs. “The project will focus at looking at how SMEs perform when trading across borders within the region,” said Ms. Sandra Uwera, chief executive officer COMESA Business Council. Sandra…

The World Bank has approved Ksh750 billion loan to Kenya that focused mainly on support for agriculture and housing, the bank said in a statement. “Measures supported by this operation are expected to benefit ordinary Kenyans through better targeting of agricultural subsidies to reach low-income farmers, prosecuting those who engage in fraudulent procurement, increasing the availability of affordable housing, and improving revenue mobilization,” said the World Bank in its approval notice. “We expect that this operation will help to reduce bid rigging in government procurement thereby leading to fiscal savings and more resources for developmental purposes,” the World Bank said.…

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will come into force on Thursday creating a single African market of over one-billion consumers with a total GDP of more than  $3-trillion. “It puts Africa on track to create the largest free trade agreement by country & population since the 1995 creation of the World Trade Organisation (WTO),” said the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). In April, the AfCFTA Agreement secured the minimum threshold of 22 ratifications for it to enter into force thirty days after the deposit of the twenty-second deposit. According to the AU and African Ministers…