Ian's Blog

  Nairobi has reached a quiet but undeniable consensus: the era of lawless matatus must come to an end. For decades, public transport in the capital has operated in a grey zone—half essential service, half organized chaos. While matatus have played a critical role in moving millions of people daily, the cost of tolerating disorder, recklessness, and impunity has grown too high. Order and civility in public transport are no longer optional aspirations; they are necessary conditions for a functional city. Matatu chaos is often defended as “culture” or “hustle,” but this framing has outlived its usefulness. Speeding, overlapping, blasting music at extreme volumes, intimidation of passengers, bribery of traffic police, and open disregard for traffic rules are not cultural expressions—they are failures of regulation and enforcement. A city cannot modernize while normalizing danger as entertainment and indiscipline as identity. Nairobi’s roads are not a theatre for adrenaline; they are p...

The question Kenyans should be asking is not radical, ideological, or unrealistic. It is profoundly practical: if powerful states can seize illicitly held wealth and redirect it toward public purpose, why can’t we? When the United Kingdom moved to freeze and force the sale of assets linked to a Russian oligarch, including Chelsea Football Club, and signaled that the proceeds would be redirected toward supporting Ukraine’s defense and reconstruction, it demonstrated something Kenya has long pretended is impossible, real accountability with material consequences. Not speeches. Not task forces. Not promises. Consequences. Kenya is not short of money. It is short of political will. For decades, the country has hemorrhaged public resources through corruption, inflated procurement, opaque public-private partnerships, dubious infrastructure contracts, and outright theft. Every Kenyan knows the names of scandals—Goldenberg, Anglo Leasing, NYS, Arror and Kimwarer dams, COVID-19 procurement frau...

  This year, I am not interested in comfort, consensus, or applause. I am interested in truth, accountability, and asking the questions we are trained to avoid. This blog exists to interrogate power, expose convenient lies, and challenge the stories we tell ourselves to survive broken systems. Some ideas here will unsettle you. Others may anger you. That is intentional. Growth does not come from silence or softness—it comes from clarity. If we are serious about justice, dignity, and the future we claim to want, then we must first be honest about the present we are tolerating.

  The people supporting William Ruto and his government are not defending ideas or principles. They are defending access . Access to tenders, appointments, protection, shortcuts, and survival within a collapsing system. They are not trying to fix Kenya; they are trying to extract from it before it burns . This is not politics, it is a hustle. It's a hustler's government after all, right? Those opposing this regime are not perfect, but they are fighting for something fundamentally different: history over handouts, principle over proximity, constitution over convenience . And that difference matters. If you support punitive taxes that crush workers, small businesses, and the unemployed while insulating political elites, then understand this clearly: you are not “pragmatic,” you are complicit. When fuel taxes rise, food prices spike, and PAYE workers are squeezed dry to service loans they never benefited from, silence becomes endorsement. Poverty is not accidental, it is policy. A...

  You walk into the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) offices to follow up on a pension matter, entering what feels like an administrative underworld where years of service fade into paperwork limbo. The Commission operates under the TSC Act 2015 , and there are references to a 2024 amendment — but what is painfully clear to anyone who has walked these corridors is this: we lost Mzee before he ever received his pension. And he is not an exception. He is the pattern. Across Kenya, teachers who have spent decades shaping young minds die waiting for what was legally due to them. Some spend ten to fifteen years chasing their pension , enduring disappearing files, stalled processes, and endless administrative circles. Time passes. People age. Some simply do not make it. What should be a dignified transition into post‑service life becomes a waiting room for death . This is not mere inefficiency. It is cruelty clothed in bureaucracy. For the small minority who receive their pensions with...

  Look at Kenya today, and one cannot help but ask: what exactly is our tradition? What is our rich heritage as a people? For a country so culturally diverse, with over forty distinct ethnic communities, the answers often feel surprisingly thin, fragmented, or borrowed. This absence of clarity did not happen by accident. It is a direct consequence of how colonialism was imposed on Kenya—a deliberate restructuring of society that left deep scars on identity, governance, and cultural continuity. Unlike other African territories where the British practiced indirect rule—such as Uganda, Nigeria, and parts of Ghana—Kenya was subjected to direct rule. In indirect rule systems, colonial administrators relied on existing local governance structures: kings, chiefs, councils, and councils of elders. These structures, while subordinated to the colonial state, were allowed to persist and evolve, creating hybrid systems where indigenous practices could coexist with imposed colonial rules. In K...