That year many farmers had gone without getting a cent from their sugarcane plantations because the two factories they used to deliver cane to had been shut down.

Edward Kimani wa Njuguna was a printer by profession. He lived in Kileleshwa in Nairobi at a friend’s servant quarters, just a few minutes’ drive from the nearby police station.

A democratic election is a process and not an event. It involves institutions, rules, regulations and procedures that provide the framework for certain actions to be undertaken over time so that the event of casting a vote may lead to a democratic outcome.

An obscure article appeared recently in one daily newspaper indicating that the Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) had given the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) a 30-day ultimatum to pay retired teachers Sh42.3 billion worth of pension money owed to them since 1997.

When the verdict is finally taken in November next year, President Barack Hussein Obama, at the end of his eight year term, will not have scored very well on his African achievements.

Pheroze Nowrojee, one of Kenya’s most prolific lawyers and human rights advocate who has always been at the forefront in the democratic struggle, never forgets to remind us that “we have come a long way in this struggle.”

Okoa Kenya, a popular initiative led by the Coalition for Reforms and Democracy (CORD) to amend the Constitution, recently presented a Draft Bill to the IEBC

Sometime last year Prof Mwangi wa Githinji of the University of Amherst in Massachusetts, USA, and I were reflecting on what happened to left wing politics in Kenya

On November 23, the President gave some directives on the fight against corruption, and declared it “a national security threat.” Somewhere towards the end of his speech His Excellency noted:

A controversy is raging between the County Government of Kisumu and Mr Francis Mutie, the Regional Commissioner.

There is a general opinion expressed sporadically that Kenya does not have an effective Opposition. Some people go further to suggest that a “responsible” Opposition should tell the Government how to correct its mistakes and hence how to run the country.

The economy is doing badly: every Kenyan knows that. The government has mismanaged the economy since May 2013: only Jubilee honchos deny this.

There is no doubt that cancer is on the increase globally. There is also no doubt that in Kenya people are becoming more aware that cancer, like many other non-communicable diseases like diabetes,

In 1896, the University of Pennsylvania requested one of its leading African-American scholars, WEB Du Bois to carry out a study of the conditions of African-Americans living in Philadelphia, the capital city of that state.

In the early part of the nineteenth century when the first freed slaves from the USA and the Caribbean islands landed on the West African coast under the auspices of the American Colonisation Society,

One of the things that happened to humankind once capitalism became a dominant mode of production, first in Western Europe and then in the rest of the world, is that people were compelled to live under certain rules governing political, economic and social life.

The latest information on the performance of the Kenyan economy shows that rapid economic growth is now uncertain.

Let us not trivialise issues of life and death. Life is sacred. I don’t think the fact that we lost 1,300 people during the post-election violence (PEV) is a matter we should deal with lightly.

The recent opinion poll findings released by Ipsos Kenya raised substantial ire and concern among the public.

When I wrote on the so-called agreement between President Uhuru Kenyatta and President Yoweri Museveni for Uganda to sell “cheap” sugar to Kenya while Kenya sells beef and milk to Uganda

The old estates in Nairobi’s Eastlands where the African working class and the walala hoi lived, had clear addresses with proper signage.

To tell you the truth I am extremely frustrated by this insecurity issue. I don’t know whether it is I who is going crazy or whether certain things just happen not to make sense any more these days.

Those who read the weekend papers regularly will remember that on May 3 and 10 this year I wrote articles on this space calling the attention of Kenyans to what was going on in Kenya Airways.

In his recent visit to Uganda, President Uhuru Kenyatta is reported to have signed a trade agreement with his host, Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, allowing the importation of sugar from Uganda to Kenya.

In the run up to the multi-party elections in 1992, a village in Muhoroni in then Kericho District was badly affected by inter-ethnic violence which displaced over 1,000 villagers. These were residents of Thessalia, known to the local community as a Centre of Catholic missionary activities.

The message we knew. The person we knew. The problem we had lived with: tribalism and the illusion of national cohesion in Kenya.

Old habits die hard; and particularly so with a certain brand of politics. It may not have dawned upon some Kenyans but it is actually true that we have a new Constitution that no longer leaves the people at the mercy of the government.

Are we living in normal or abnormal times? Is there any time in the near future that the security of the country will, as it were, be normal?

Day after day we read of tragic events in our nation—killings by the Al-Shabaab in the northern parts of our country; disappearances of directors of a land buying company in Murang’a; panga-wielding youths urged by an MP to get ready to cut political opponents to pieces rather than waste their time cutting grass; youths in a school knifing each other to death over some love affairs gone sour.

“We always take it for granted that when we bring up our kids they will be there till we pass on. The children will see us to the grave, not the other way round.

On Thursday June 23, 2015, Patrick Kenya, a resident of Kisumu County in the Maseno area, accused me of "preaching wine and drinking water" regarding my response to Kabage Karanja's comments on the matter of the appointment of the Governor of Central Bank.

Saba Saba is a few days away. I write today’s essay in memory of Saba Saba. It was an important landmark in our struggle for the Second Liberation. But it was not the only one. It is the most celebrated.

I will not bore my readers with figures regarding how much was allocated to food production and where in the current budget.

My former student, insurance broker and friend Kabage Karanja, in an article published in The Standard on June 15 (Monday) this week reacted to my OpEd article in the Sunday Standard a week ago.

Political parties and politicians are letting Kenyans down. We should rescue our nation from what is essentially a perfunctory process of budget making which is very rich in form but completely bereft in content.