Dispatch from Mombasa

Gavana Mvurya aungana na kina mama kucheza ngoma ya kitamaduni katika mojawapo wa hafla katika kauti ya Kwale  Imetolewa: www.standardmedia.co.ke Gavana wa Kwale SalimMvury a ana sababu za kushangilia baada ya Kaunti ya Kwale kutajwa kama mojawapo wa kaunti ambazo zinatumia pesa za miradi ya maendeleo kwa njia sawasawa. Taarifa katika gazeti la Nation zinasema Kaunti ya Kwale ilitumia asilimia 57.3 ya matumizi yake ya maendeleo, hiki kikiwa ndicho kiwango cha juu zaidi cha matumizi katika mwaka wa serikali ulioisha Juni 30. Zamani, Mvurya alikuwa afisa wa maendeleo ya kijamii akifanya kazi na shirika la Plan International na huenda hapo ndipo alikereka na umaskini mkubwa ulioenea katika eneo la Kwale. Alipochaguliwa Mvurya aliyapatia kipaumbele maswala ya kuimarisha jamii kama vile kutengeneza   barabara, maji   na elimu na kutenga zaidi ya shilingi Milioni 400 kwa miradi hiyo.   Taarifa hizo bila shaka huenda zikaweka kicheko cha ushindi katika mid...

Businessman Sulaiman  Shahbal says he is in Mombasa to stay and those wishing that he will shift his political base to Lamu are day dreaming. Shahbal said although he has roots in Lamu, his political base is in Mombasa. Popularly known as SS among his supporters, Shahbal said that what his detractors were engaged in was wishful thinking that he would ease himself out of their way. The soft spoken politician enjoys significant following across voters of different persuasions and is seen as the main contender for the Mombasa gubernatorial position. He is currently behind a grassroots  movement calling itself "Change Movement" that has sent chills down the spine of his opponents both in Jubilee and Cord. A section of the opponents have suggested that Jubilee Alliance Party should conduct grassroots election to determine who should be it's flag bearer in Mombasa, a challenge that Shahbal welcomed with open hands. "Who expects to be given a position on a silver plat...

Claims by President Barack Obama half-brother Malik Obama that he will be voting Donald Trump in the upcoming American general elections has torn down the middle the President’s ancestral home in Kogello in western Kenya, with village leaders opposing the views. Responding to a report in the New York Post , the chairman of Kogello Nyang’oma village, in Siaya County, President Obama’s ancestral home, Mr. Vitalis Awandu Ondewe said that the village was solely behind Democrats presidential flagbearer Hillary Clinton and their son Barack Obama. “I was shocked to read the report. We are for the Democratic Party fulltime. We are supporting Hilary and she is going to win,” Mr Ondewe said in a telephone conversation with the writer. Ondewe said he was unconcerned about the support of Malik to Donald Trump because that was his opinion as an individual and did not have the backing of the community. “Majority of this community or Luo community or many Kenyans we are for the Democratic p...

Source: Standard Media Eight members of parliament   had their day in court  where they were charged with incitement to violence. The eight had been languishing in police cells since Tuesday when the magistrate ordered that they be incarcerated pending completion of investigations into their case by the Director of Public Prosecutions. As I reflect about the plight of the six, a question that keeps coming to my mind is aren’t we all haters? Shouldn’t all of us have our day in court? Shouldn’t all of us be locked in the filthiest of police cells so as to reflect on the amount of hate that we spew whether online or socially? While the eight may have been open in their alleged divisive rhetoric, a good number of us are closet tribalists (I borrow the term from Miguna Miguna’s Peeling off the Mask). We hate, divide people send signals of hate, we polarise, we just do anything that would justify our hate of other people but hiding under the freedom of expression and othe...

I cannot fully recall how the debate started but all I can remember is that we were having a debate about the communicative power of silence. I found the debate intellectually stimulating and decided to on my own learn a few facts about silence and communication. Of course I had to try and see how it links to my two pet areas of preoccupation –politics and internal organisational communication. Meaningful silence as advanced by Johannsen (1974) and Jaworski (1993) is where thought processes are involved and the hearer of the message intentionally withholds a response to the speaker. The speaker is left to use his/her own means to find out the response which more often is gotten from the nonverbal cues. Now, the 2017 general elections are just around the corner. Aspirants and incumbents in equal measure are running like headless chicken in early campaigns earnestly  trying to convince voters that they are the best choices. For incumbents, anything that seems to oppose or spea...

The location is the Chief’s office Likoni. The time is 11.00a.m. The sweltering Mombasa heat makes you feel like you want to go topless. *wink. Being a Monday, a crowd has already built at the office waiting to be served by the Chief. And he does not disappoint. His office keeps spitting out client after client. However, the number of service seekers doesn’t seem to dwindle and are increasing by the minute. When it is my turn to be served, I cheerfully greet the chief who responds with an air of indifference. He already looks tired. He momentarily puts his hands behind his head and yawns. Behind him is an open window from where not less than three metres away is a roadside hotel. Whenever the lazy wind changes it direction, smoke mixed with the smell of chapatti wafts into the Chief’s office distracting his attention. His office, a residential house turned office must be the most uninspiring place to work in. The last time it saw a coat of paint must have been when it was occupi...

MOVE TO JOIN JUBILEE PRESSURES GOVT TO DELIVER IN ORDER TO SECURE POLITICAL LIVES OF THE MUNG’ARO GROUP. Mung'aro with Deputy President William Ruto. Source: www.nation.coke Two major political happenings took place in Coast within the last one week. One, the media reported that six MPs from Kwale and Kilifi Counties had expressed their desire to work with the Jubilee Government and if need be decamp to the party so that they can be “part and parcel” of Government.  Two, efforts by Likoni MP Masudi Mwalimu Mwahima to have residents allocated the Waitiki land bore fruits when it was reported that finally they would formally possess the land because they were to be issued with title deeds. The two happenings though political can be seen and interpreted differently. In the first happening, the six Mps Gunga Mwinga (Kaloleni, Kadu Asili), Peter Shehe (Ganze Federal Party (CORD), Harrsion Kombe (Magarini, Jubilee ), William Kamoti (Rabai ODM), Mustaffa Iddi (Kilifi South ...