Tuesday, March 21, 2006

CRIME OVERTAKES CORRUPTION IN KENYA!

Kenyan crime puts off investment.

Corruption worries are long-standing in Kenya. Crime has now topped corruption as the biggest barrier to foreign investment in the Kenyan capital Nairobi, a senior UN official has warned. Paul Andre de la Porte, who heads the United Nations Development Programme in Nairobi, noted that Kenya still led global corruption tables. But he said the capital's soaring crime rate was now even more of a problem. Nairobi and its 3.5 million population has had to endure increasing levels of robberies, murder and rapes. We consider there is an insecure climate in terms of foreign investors operating in the country [Kenya] Risk consultant Rashna Writer.

"We are living in dangerous times," Nairobi's Sunday Standard newspaper said in a recent report on crime. It is today so much a fact of life in the city that private security guards stand outside banks and shops, and homes in well-off suburbs are protected by high walls and electric fences. Public information billboards warn women to guard themselves against rape. "If we could get rid of the level of insecurity that we have in Kenya, that would be a major breakthrough for its socio-economic development," said Mr de la Porte.

Recent figures show that Kenya received just $46m (£26m) in foreign direct investments in 2004, compared to $237m in Uganda and $470m in Tanzania. Such are the twin problems of corruption and crime in Kenya that Merchant International Group - a London-based consultancy which measures investment risk - recently gave Kenya a worse rating than Sudan, despite the conflict in Sudan's Darfur region. "We consider there is an insecure climate in terms of foreign investors operating in the country [Kenya]," said Rashna Writer, head of the consultancy's global risk department.

Thousands of people recently marched through Nairobian protest at a police clampdown against an independent newspaper. They have called for the resignation of the government's internal security minister John Michuki.
BBC NEWS REPORT.

1 Comments:

Blogger Omar Basawad said...

Very sad indeed! Such a beautiful country! Such wonderful people! Kenyans have had their lives 'ripped off' by politicians!

The extent of corruption and government inefficiency is just mind boggling! And there seems no end to it! Now we have the 'Armenian' charade! One wonders, what next?

As if all this is not enough, crime seem to have dramatically increased in the last few years. And then, there is the price hikes and shortage of food. Kenyans, of all people, don't deserve all this!

2:49 pm  

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