Author: Muindi

Governments across sub-Saharan Africa do not rewrite education law for a connectivity grant. Yet that is precisely what happened. Through the Airtel Africa Foundation’s flagship $57 million partnership with UNICEF, two countries moved from receiving infrastructure support to embedding digital education permanently into national legislation. The Foundation’s 2025/2026 Annual Report documents that shift in detail, alongside the numbers behind a first full year of scaled delivery. From pledge to law: the $57 million UNICEF alliance The five-year partnership with UNICEF, launched in 2021, now stands as one of the most consequential digital learning alliances on the continent. In this reporting…

East Africa’s two most closely watched banks spent 2025 doing the same thing: making the branch redundant. Equity Group Holdings and KCB Group, the region’s two largest banks by assets, released their 2025 annual results and sustainability disclosures within months of each other. Read together, the documents describe a banking sector in the middle of a structural shift — one that is moving transactions, lending, payments, and even customer onboarding off the teller counter and into digital infrastructure that operates at a fraction of the cost. The Branch Is Losing the Transaction War At Equity Group, 98.2% of all transactions…

Absa Bank Kenya has launched a developer-linked home financing solution that cuts straight to the structural problem holding back homeownership in Kenya — the disconnect between buyers, developers, and affordable credit. The product, known internally as the developer off-taker proposition, carries a home loan rate of 8.9% per annum and offers financing of up to 105% for qualifying buyers. A Supply Crisis, Not a Demand Problem Kenya’s housing deficit stands at over two million units. Annual demand runs at roughly 250,000 households, yet the market delivers fewer than 50,000 units per year. That gap does not exist because Kenyans do…

Family Bank will debut on the Nairobi Securities Exchange on 23 June 2026, after the Capital Markets Authority granted formal approval for the lender to list by way of introduction. A listing by introduction places the bank’s existing 1.305 billion shares on the NSE for public trading without issuing new shares. No fresh capital enters the bank. Instead, the mechanism opens the market to all investors, unlocks liquidity for current shareholders, and lets open trading set a transparent price for the stock. Why Now The timing reflects years of deliberate preparation rather than opportunism. Managing Director Nancy Njau framed it…

Uganda Airlines has signed a $982 million agreement with Boeing for 10 new aircraft, the most significant fleet commitment in the carrier’s short history and a direct statement of intent in one of Africa’s most contested aviation markets. President Yoweri Museveni witnessed the signing at State House Entebbe on Tuesday. The deal, valued at approximately Shs 3.7 trillion, covers both passenger and cargo aircraft and forms the centrepiece of the government’s strategy to use aviation as a lever for trade, tourism and inward investment. Officials drew attention to the first four aircraft due under the contract, building on last year’s…

Kenya’s Central Bank held its benchmark lending rate unchanged on Tuesday, choosing to stand still as inflation climbed to its highest level in more than two years and the private sector showed signs of deepening strain. The Monetary Policy Committee, chaired by CBK Governor Dr. Kamau Thugge, maintained the Central Bank Rate at 8.75% at its June 9, 2026 meeting. The decision ends a rate-cutting cycle that delivered 10 consecutive reductions totalling 425 basis points since August 2024. The MPC last cut in February 2026, lowering the rate by 25 basis points to stimulate private sector credit. That cut now…