Mutilated Home (On Gender Dysphoria)

I dream of plains of skin; black velvet plains with horizontal perturbed scars when I look at my chest. I dream of a body not yet here. I dream of movement through bodies. Mutilating and cutting to fit me. To mark me. To mark the existence of myself in this body. For this body to […]

Emerging Citizen Agency? The Great Finance Bill Debate

I do not seek to get into the pros and cons of the recently enacted Finance Act by the Kenya Kwanza government, even though it elicits a remark or more. Rather, it is the emotion that the bill – and later on the Act – has aroused across the country that most pricks my curiosity. In my view, there have been fewer times when national discourse has been characterized by great animation like has been the case as regards this piece of legislation (first proposed, then passed, and now challenged in court). 

Kenyans Aren’t Making Love Anymore, Mr. President

“Wanawake saa hizi hata kushuka hatushuki . . . Hatuna muda hata wa kuenjoy na kina baba nyumbani, kwa ajili kila siku unawaza watoto watakula nini . . . kama baba ni dereva, mwenye gari ameuza (gari) kwa sababu mafuta imepanda bei. Kwa hivyo wewe mama ukabangaize ulete mboga, ukaokote mahindi  yanayotoka border ya Tanzania […]

Finance Act 2023 Reminiscent of Colonialists’ Hut Tax

The Finance Act 2023 also has colonial undertones that should make Kenyans very nervous. “The levy to enable more Kenyans to own their own houses is morphing into something akin to the obnoxious colonial ‘hut tax’,” stated an editorial in the Daily Nation.  The tax that the newspaper is referring to is the Native Hut Tax, introduced in 1901, when the British wanted to consolidate their power over this land and its people.  All huts used as a dwelling were expected to pay an annual tax.