Month: November 2016

South African President Jacob Zuma survived an attempt to oust him from office only after a “robust” and “difficult” debate within the ruling ANC party, an official said Tuesday.
Zuma has been weakened by corruption allegations, but his supporters were taken by surprise at the plot to unseat him at a weekend meeting of the African National Congress’s executive committee.
The rebellion, led by at least four ministers, was the most serious threat to Zuma’s hold on power since he became president in 2009.
It also shook the ANC party, which has ruled since the end of apartheid in 1994 but recently suffered a sharp setback in local elections.
“Following robust, honest, candid and at times difficult discussions, the (ANC national executive committee) did not support the call for the president to step down,” Gwede Mantashe, the ANC secretary general, told reporters.
“All members of the (executive committee) had an opportunity to raise, in the meeting, the issues they feel are hurting the movement and the country.”
Local media said the meeting — which was extended into Monday evening — was tense, with tempers flaring and some ministers threatening to resign if Zuma stayed, a claim the party denied.
“We are not aware of anyone who has said they are going to resign,” ANC deputy secretary general Jessie Duarte insisted.
Reports also claimed the president launched a fierce defence of his position, and his loyalists eventually headed off the attempt to oust him.
“The president told us that he will never step down, as it would be like handing himself over to the enemy, and that there are people who want to see him in jail,” an unnamed source at the closed-door meeting told the News24 website.
Zuma left South Africa early on Tuesday to attend the funeral of Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
Mmusi Maimane, leader of the main opposition Democratic Alliance party, said the ANC’s decision to back Zuma was “no surprise”.
“Zuma clearly holds all the power in the ANC,” Maimane said in a statement.
“We can never trust an ANC that keeps Zuma through all he has done.
“While the ANC continues to fight amongst themselves, our economy is hanging by a thread.”
The president has been hit by multiple corruption scandals and damaging court rulings this year, while the ANC performed poorly in local polls in August and unemployment has hit a 13-year high.
Zuma has been under renewed pressure since a graft probe earlier this month unearthed fresh allegations of misconduct.
The probe by the country’s top watchdog uncovered evidence of possible criminal activity in his relationship with the Guptas, a business family accused of wielding undue political influence.
However Zuma, 74, retains strong loyalty among many rank-and-file ANC party members, as well as its lawmakers.
He easily survived a vote of no confidence in parliament on November 10 — and will face his third of 2016 next week after an urgent application by the rowdy populist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party.
“Bring it on, if the EFF wants to,” Duarte told reporters Tuesday. “This is the only weapon they have.”
Peter Montalto, analyst from Nomura bank, said Zuma would only leave “when the patronage faction around him decide it is time”.
“The ANC may well be tired of Zuma but it’s not clear it is ready to conclude anything on succession yet,” he said in a briefing note.
Zuma is due to stand down in 2019 after serving the maximum two terms.

The Nairobi Assembly County Speaker Alex Mogelo was on Tuesday left with no option but to adjourn debate on Governor Evans Kidero’s impeachment motion after shockingly only one Member of the County Assembly showed up at the house chambers.
The sole member was Parklands MCA Jeffer Kassam.
Nairobi County has a total of 128 Members of the County Assembly (42 nominated) including Assembly Speaker Magelo.
The speaker later told reporters that the MCAs were away in Kisumu attending Intercounty games despite him last week calling for the members to debate the motion this week.
The impeachment motion was sponsored by Viwandani MCA Samuel Nyangwara, who argued that failure to disclose the debts had resulted in gross misconduct on the part of the governor.
The ward rep accused the governor of flouting procurement laws and acting contrary to the Constitution as well as the Public Finance Management Act.
In October, a similar impeachment motion failed to kick off after the Speaker adjourned the sitting for lack of quorum.
 
The speaker adjourned the house after all Cord and 20 Jubilee MCAs boycotted the session.
A section of the Cord MCAs instead convened at Boulevard hotel.
Some of their Jubilee counterparts claimed Kidero “paid” the ward representatives to boycott the sitting in a bid to frustrate the ouster bid.
 
The motion had been earlier suspended after Kidero obtained a court order stopping the county assembly from summoning him to appear before a select committee to answer audit queries arising from the county government’s expenditure.
Through lawyer Tom Ojienda, the county boss argued the summons requiring him to appear before the county assembly to defend himself against allegations of corruption and abuse of office were unlawful and did not meet the requirements of standing orders.
However, in order to bar the county assembly from debating his impeachment motion.
Under a certificate of urgency, Magelo said that Kidero misdirected the court saying that the governor had been “summoned” while instead he had only been notified on the motion and invited to respond to allegations against him.
The case is to be heard on January 17, 2017.

is real! When you want to go peel, but the series is so good you don’t want to leave your seat or the gossip is to juicy for you to miss any word said. In the end, you prolong your pee moment to like the end of the day. That’s pee procrastination.
How many times do you pee in a day? Twice? Four times? According to Lauren Streicher, MD, an ob-gyn and associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern University’s the Feinberg School of Medicine, “You should be urinating every four to six hours, if you’re always holding your pee in for too long, there are consequences.”
So here’s what happens ladies if you always procrastinate your loo moments
 
According to Dr. Streicher, you need to think your bladder like a balloon. A balloon that’s being over filled with water, the balloon stretches to its limit and becomes heavy. So does your bladder, the longer you wait, the harder it will become to criss cross yourself to the bathroom without peeing on yourself.
A full grown-woman peeing on herself because she couldn’t go to the bathroom fast enough, is such a horrible sight.
Our coordinate to either release pee or hold it, but the longer you stay with pee in your bladder, you can end up with some real dysfunction of your pelvic floor muscles which will then result to you losing control of your bladder functions.
 
So the re-occurrence of you always holding your pee will in the end harm you more than the few minutes you could have rushed to the bathroom to relive yourself.
See the pain you always feel in your bladder when you are holding on to pee for so l0ong but suddenly disappear when you empty your bladder? This pain could be life-long.
“Once the pain signals have been trigged in the lower abdomen, the pain may not just go away,” Dr. Streicher says. “Your muscles are clenching and are almost in a spasm, so they’re not able to just relax.”
 
Your bladder may not blow up cause of pee, but it will stretch out. According to “one of the big side effects of an overextended bladder? Your body may start missing cues that your bladder needs emptied, and those messages your brain sends to your body that it needs to go to the bathroom are important (for obvious reasons)”.
Good news is, you can hold in the pee but not to the point you feel uncomfortable, just a good measure.
 
 

South Africa’s jovial leader Jacob Zuma is a former herdboy who was once known as the “Teflon president” — but no longer.
Late US president Ronald Reagan first earned the sobriquet Teflon — “nothing sticks” — for surviving a series of scandals while in office, and 74-year-old Zuma has done much the same through a very different set of problems.
Now things are getting sticky for him.
A past freedom fighter, Zuma has kept his political career alive despite a trial on charges of raping a family friend as well as allegations of corruption, abuse of power and misusing $24 million of state funds to refurbish his private residence.
As leader of the late Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress (ANC), which has won every election since South Africa became a democracy in 1994, Zuma was an easy victor when securing a second five-year term in 2014.
The son of a domestic worker, he has “a very strong appeal” to the working class and the poor, says Sdumo Dlamini, head of the Confederation of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), an ANC ally.
“He is a people’s person and he has grown through the ranks of the working class. He knows the suffering of the ordinary folk.”
Born on April 12, 1942, in the rural outpost of Nkandla in the north of the coastal province of KwaZulu-Natal, Zuma had a meteoric rise in politics though it was marked by controversy.
Popularly referred to as “JZ”, he enjoys loyalty from millions of ANC grassroots supporters awed by his journey from uneducated cattle herder to president, with a 10-year stint as an apartheid-era political prisoner along the way.
When he took the reins of the ANC in 2007 in a putsch against ex-president Thabo Mbeki, Zuma inherited a party riddled with divisions that had festered under Mbeki, who was accused of being out of touch with the masses.
Tensions have since deepened further as poverty and unemployment levels continue to blight the country more than 20 years after the end of white-minority rule, and the ANC has been accused of losing its moral compass.
As criticism of his reign mounted, Zuma has maintained a cheerful public facade, often giggling and laughing as the allegations against him built up.
But he has also made significant U-turns to head off the most damaging lines of attack, and has been significantly weakened over the last year.
Last December, he was forced into a climbdown after firing a respected minister of finance and appointing a man widely seen as a stooge.
As the local rand currency went into freefall, Zuma bowed to pressure and reappointed an admired former finance minister to the key post.
And in March he finally agreed to pay back some of the public money spent on his rural residence at Nkandla — backing down and apologising after two years of resistance.
Zuma’s private life is as colourful as his political career.
A proud traditionalist, he often swaps his suits for full leopard-pelt Zulu warrior gear, engaging in energetic ground-stomping tribal dances during ceremonies in his village.
At ANC rallies, he is normally the first to break into tuneful song.
In the past, he loved leading supporters in the rousing anti-apartheid struggle song “Umshini Wami” (Bring Me My Machine Gun), which became his signature tune.
The teetotaller and non-smoker has four wives and at least 20 children, making Zuma the only president in sub-Saharan Africa who is an open polygamist.
Before taking office, Zuma dismayed the nation during his 2006 rape trial when he told the court he had showered after having sex with his young HIV-positive accuser to avoid contracting the virus.
He was head of the country’s national AIDS council at the time.
Zuma was acquitted of rape but is mocked in newspaper cartoons — where he is often depicted with a shower nozzle sprouting from his bald head — and in art.
An infamous painting called “The Spear”, which showed him in a Vladimir Lenin pose with his genitals exposed, stirred a racially charged storm in 2010 when senior ANC officials campaigned to have it removed from a gallery and it was vandalised.
During Zuma’s time in power, South Africa has also been rocked by increasing social unrest over a failure to provide enough housing and basic services such as electricity and water to end the inequalities of apartheid.
Despite the stalling economy and the many calls for him to stand down, Zuma may well see off his critics and stay in office until his term ends in 2019.

“Goodfellas” director Martin Scorsese is to be granted a private audience with Pope Francis on Wednesday after unveiling his latest film to an audience of 400 Jesuits, the Vatican said.
“Silence”, an adaptation of Shusaku Endo’s 1966 novel of the same name, tells the story of two Jesuit missionaries (played by Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver) who visit 17th century Japan in the footsteps of their mentor (Liam Neeson).
Francis was not due to attend the screening of the film in Rome on Tuesday, despite its subject being close to his heart.
A member of the Jesuit order, the Argentinian pontiff wanted to become a missionary in Japan himself as a young man but was prevented from doing so by ill health.
Scorsese’s numerous acclaimed films include 1988’s “The Last Temptation of Christ”, which was condemned as blasphemous by some Christian groups.
The veteran director was to attend the Rome screening of his latest work, for which a senior figure in the Jesuit order was employed as a consultant.
The order, officially known as the Society of Jesus, also granted the production team access to its historical archives for research.
The film is due for release in the United States on December 23.

Barclays sees maintained Kenyan growth on the back of strengthened agricultural output and increased investment in infrastructure
While addressing leading corporates during the Barclays Africa Forum held in Nairobi, Barclays Africa Group Limited (BAGL) Chief Economist Jeff Gable cautioned that the “politics of rage” being experienced in advanced economies, as witnessed in the outcome of the Brexit and the US election, are set to put further pressure on Africa’s economic growth.
Strengthening of the dollar, rising finance costs, and lower capital flows were also highlighted as factors set to dampen the region’s growth, alongside reduced tourism spending and lower remittances.
However, strong agricultural output and surging infrastructure spend look likely to maintain Kenya on its current growth trajectory, despite these external setbacks, he said.
“With tourism arrivals having shown significant recovery during 2016 from the lows of 2015, the Brexit vote may now dampen that recovery in the short to mid-term,” he said.
 
Barclays is confident however that higher levels of infrastructure and oil investment, and strengthening agricultural output, mean GDP growth is likely to remain strong over the long term.
Moreover, the country’s growth has created hundreds of thousands of new formal and informal sector jobs since 2011, in contrast to other African nations where GDP growth has not always been accompanied by job creation.
 
Kenya’s relative insulation from falling commodity prices, as a buyer rather than a supplier of many of the world’s fuels and minerals, sees the country’s economy now growing faster than the average for Sub Saharan Africa, and running markedly ahead of the world’s average GDP growth.
Against this backdrop, the country’s government and balance of payments deficits continue to be a “cause for concern”, with interest payments on government debt this year consuming some 20 per cent of the country’s tax revenues.
However, “strong economic growth and better oversight bode well,” said Gable.
Nonetheless, “we expect a continued depreciation of the shilling into 2017, with the biggest risks related to elections and dollar strength,” said Gable.
 
Beyond the political risk, there is a real possibility of further market setbacks.
“With more than a quarter of the bonds in major indices currently offering negative yields, global funds have moved into risk assets, notably gold and emerging markets.
But as the scope for monetary policy nears its limits, any reversal could be sharp,” he said.
This could see investment funds withdrawing at speed from many African markets, putting further pressure on the Kenyan shilling.
BAGL produces annual market forecasts for SubSaharan Africa, as well as daily market commentaries, on its research portal ‘Barclays Live’.

South Korean President Park Geun-Hye enjoyed rock-star popularity for most of her life as a conservative icon — until an influence-peddling scandal turned her into a target of nationwide anger and sparked the dramatic downfall of the country’s onetime “princess”.
Park, the daughter of the late military dictator Park Chung-Hee, spent most of her childhood under the spotlight as her father oversaw the country’s economic transformation during his 1961-1979 rule.
Images of the young Park growing up at the presidential Blue House endeared her to South Koreans, with the first family treated as royalty by some.
The deaths of Park’s parents in the 1970s further fanned sympathy for her as an ill-fated young woman who lost parents to assassinations but managed to rise above the personal tragedy.
Park’s mother was murdered five years before her father, who was assassinated by his own security chief in 1979.
Park subsequently kept a low profile for nearly two decades until 1998, when she made a successful bid to become a lawmaker as the South was reeling from the fallout of the 1997-98 Asian economic crisis.
She instantly became a star among older conservative Koreans, who felt she shared her father’s leadership qualities and was someone who could revive the economy at a time of crisis.
But her political career was always overshadowed by the legacy of her father — who is credited with dragging the country out of poverty but reviled for his regime’s human rights abuses.
The memory of the father, who seized power in an army coup and ruled with an iron fist, dogged Park, with critics accusing her of inheriting her father’s intolerance of dissents.
But Park still commanded a loyal following among many voters, earning her nickname the “Queen of Elections.”
Such loyalty helped her weather several crises after she became the country’s first female president in 2012, including the sinking of a Sewol ferry that killed 300 in 2014.
The fact that Park, 64, never married was also part of her appeal in a country where past leaders were often embroiled in major corruption scandals involving family members.
But the latest scandal involving Choi Soon-Sil, the so-called “shaman advisor” for Park, turned out to be too much even for the staunchest Park supporters.
It also shed light on Park’s questionable, decades-long ties with Choi’s late father, a shady religious figure who in the 1970s was accused of using his ties with Park to extract vast amounts of money from local firms.
A state probe claimed that Choi had followed her father’s footstep, colluding with Park to coerce local firms to “donate” tens of millions of dollars to non-profit foundations which were then used for Choi’s personal gain.
The scandal has sent Park’s once-bulletproof approval ratings to record lows and prompted hundreds of thousands to repeatedly take to the streets calling for Park’s ouster.
Now Park, the first sitting South Korean president to be subject to a criminal probe, is facing the bleak prospect of impeachment and potential imprisonment if she is forced out — a disgrace that was unimaginable only a year ago.
“The sense of betrayal is so immense… because I trusted her so much,” Kim Young-Rah, a 62-year-old housewife from Daegu, Park’s hometown, said during a recent mass protest in Seoul.
Kim said she and many friends of her age looked up to Park as a “princess” during their childhood and later an “ideal, incorruptible” politician who kept her distance even from her own relatives.
“Now it was all fantasy… my fantasy has completely been shattered,” she said, waving a banner reading “Throw Park Geun-Hye into jail!”
“I don’t even want to see her face anymore.”

Menstruation aka period, is normal vaginal bleeding that occurs as part of a woman’s. The body sheds the lining of the womb if no pregnancy occurs. Menstruation differs from one woman to the next in terms of flow and longevity, ranging from 3-5 days, the blood contains blood and tissue found inside the uterus.
During menses, women wear different things to prevent the flow of blood trickling down our legs or soil our clothes, from tampons/ pads to sponge, cotton or clothing.
Unless you are in your menopause, you will get periods, yes, the use of pills might delay or change your cycle, but it will still come.
Worst thing to do ladies is being unhygienic while using the various products for your period, i.e not changing your pads or tampons.
If not soaked already, your pad or tampon can only stay 4-6hours unchanged with maximum of 8hours. Do you know the risks you put yourself in for walking with that soaked tampon or pad the whole day?
is a rare but a deadly disease.
 
TSS is caused by built up bacteria in your vajayjay, if you do not use the correct tampons absorbents depending on your flow or if you  don’t change it often enough. TSS is real. If you use tampons, you should read on the that died from using tampons, might wake you up to the dangers of not using tampons the correct way.
I’m sure you’ve experienced it this even once. So rash is brought if you do not change your pad regularly plus if the pad is wet for long it rubs your “lips” chaffing you. So once you start feeling some rash, Vaseline helps reduce and you should make sure you are dry during periods.
You HAVE to shower. Seem pretty obvious? But it’s not.
 
You have to shower at least twice. The blood usually “hides” in the skin on your labia and the opening of your vagina, so showering cleans the blood away. But if for any reason you cannot shower, you can use a toilet paper to clean yourself or wet wipes.
You are at risk of if you stay with pads longer than expected. UTI comes when the bladder is inflamed due to a virus or bacterial infection, mostly E. Coli bacteria. UTI is a bitch!
 
Escherichia coli (E.Coli), lives peacefully in the low intestine and bowel, but once they make their way to the bladder, trouble begins. Because bacteria tend to survive in warm, moist places, the urethra area is a common breeding site. So the overstayed blood on the pad provides a bridge for bacteria from your anus to your urethra.

Emma Morano, humanity’s last known survivor of the 19th century, turned 117 in style on Tuesday, dressing up for the occasion and demanding to know “does my hair look all right?” before having her photograph taken.
The oldest known person alive can hardly see, is very hard of hearing, has been largely bed-bound for the last year and has not left her small second-storey flat in Verbania on the shores of Lake Maggiore in northern Italy for over two decades.
But her doctor, Carlo Bava, said his patient remained alert and continued to have a reasonable quality of life.
Bava told AFP she was very aware of all the fuss being made about her reaching the latest milestone in a remarkable life that began on November 29, 1899.
“She is very lucid, very present,” Bava said.
“She was very happy and honoured to get a telegram of congratulations this morning from President (Sergio) Mattarella.
“There was a television crew there and she got flowers. She had dressed up and she was very proud. She posed for a photographer and even asked if her hair looked good.
“So I think you can say she is on good form.”
Morano has reached a ripe old age despite an extraordinarily tough life, even by the standards of many of her contemporaries, and following a diet that flouts almost every piece of established medical wisdom.
“I eat two eggs a day, and that’s it. And cookies. But I do not eat much because I have no teeth,” she told AFP in an interview last month.
She has long eschewed vegetables and her consumption of fruit is limited to the occasional handful of grapes or snacks of apple puree.
Her prodigious egg habit started when she was diagnosed with anaemia at 20 and a doctor told her to start eating two raw and one cooked every day: a habit she maintained until her appetite began to ebb slightly around the age of 110.
When she still had teeth, she was also fond of chomping chicken and lean raw steak.
Along with her fondness for pure protein, she has always had a sweet tooth meaning visitors were usually advised to come bearing gifts of Colomba, a cake rich in egg and butter that Italians associate with Easter, or Pannetone and Pandoro, traditional Christmas treats of a similar ilk.
But it wasn’t clear if she would be enjoying any of the birthday cake she received on Tuesday.
“The last time I ate a little, but then I did not feel good,” she confided to AFP last month.
Bava suspects that Morano has thrived despite her unusual diet, not because of it.
“I think her secret is genetic. All of her family lived very a very long time,” the doctor said.
“The diet she has had would have destroyed the liver of most people. But with Emma, I think she could even eaten pebbles and she would still have lived a very long time.
“What might be more important is that she has always had a very strong strong character. It has always been her who decides what she does or doesn’t do.”
Morano herself has attributed her longevity to having the courage to take the life-changing decision of leaving a violent husband in 1938, shortly after the death in infancy of their son, her only child.
It was always an unhappy marriage. Years before, her true love had gone off to fight in World War I and not come back.
Leaving a husband was no easy thing to do in the Church-dominated Italy of the 1930s and Morano worked in a factory producing jute sacks to support herself.
“Back then, the workers in those factories were constantly breathing in dust and yet her lungs are fine — that’s genetics,” said Bava.

A lucrative opportunity has opened up for Kenyan individuals, designers, architects and pretty much anyone interested in solving the housing crisis in Africa.
Pan-African housing development finance institution Shelter Afrique has today announced the launch of a competition that will boost affordable housing in Africa and see winners take home USD100,000.
 
The competition dubbed 5,000 For 5,000 Home Competition, will aim at stimulating innovative thinking on how a livable and sustainable home can be designed and produced at a capital cost of no more than USD5,000 to the end user.
With about two thirds of the population in Africa’s cities and townships live on less than USD 3.10 per day and universally, housing supply has failed to respond to the need of this significant and legitimate population.
The cost of new housing including those built by government agencies are significantly higher than what people with low incomes can afford. Below is a low cost luxury houses financed by Shelter Afrique.
 
The consequence of this is the rapid growth of informal settlements, slums on the edge of Africa’s major cities with obvious consequences for economic development, health, safety and security.
The competition will seek to highlight this problem and provide a sustainable solution that can be emulated in different countries.
The Competition is open to anyone including individuals, team of designers, artists, architects, engineers and other players in the housing sector.
Shelter Afrique has set aside a prize fund of US$100,000 to go to the top entries, with most of the money going to the top 3 entries.
Speaking to media in Nairobi, Kenya, Shelter Afrique’s Managing Director James Mugerwa said, “This competition aims to spur discussion and bring out affordable housing concepts that might be out there for the rising urban population”
The Competition is open to anyone including individuals, team of designers, artists, architects, engineers and other players in the housing sector.
Shelter Afrique has set aside a prize fund of US$100,000 to go to the top entries, with most of the money going to the top 3 entries.
The anticipated outcomes and objectives for the competition include ensuring people access a duplicable model of a USD5000 home (at 2016 prices),  urban planning to underpin large scale low income housing programme including over 1 million homes across Sub-Sahara Africa by 2025.
It also seeks the development of a sustainable supply chain able to support a large scale low income housing delivery programme whilst at the same time creating new jobs.
Details on the competition can be accessed here

Turkey’s EU Affairs Minister Omer Celik on Tuesday dismissed a European Parliament vote to freeze accession talks with Ankara as the “most unjust resolution in history” and urged solidarity instead.
During a visit to Brussels, Celik sought to ease tensions exacerbated by the non-binding vote last week to halt Turkey’s membership process over its “disproportionate” crackdown since July’s failed coup.
“Turkey is a big country, a magnificent country and the people of this country live in pluralism. They stand up for democracy,” Celik told both European and Turkish journalists.
“The European Parliament’s taking this resolution against such a society is the most unjust resolution in history,” he said trying to clear up what he sees as EU misperceptions. “Today, now is the time for solidarity.”
Ahead of talks with the European Commission’s First Vice President Frans Timmermans and other officials, Celik renewed charges that the EU failed to show sympathy with a democratic country rocked by the deadly July 15 coup attempt.
“Please try to empathise with us,” he pleaded.
But the parliamentary vote underscored growing European concerns over rights and democracy in Turkey, especially over the coup crackdown that has seen almost 37,000 arrested.
Turkey formally applied to become an EU member in 1987 and accession talks only began in 2005, even though Ankara’s aspirations to become part of the bloc dates back to the 1960s.
“If there were objective, fair negotiations… then there is no reason why Turkey would not be a full member state today,” Celik said.
The parliament vote escalated tensions with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who threatened to retaliate by rupturing a March deal that has sharply reduced the flow of migrants to Europe.
Erdogan on Tuesday said his country has not yet given up on its ambition to join the EU but has “many other alternatives” if the stalled process goes nowhere.
Apart from Timmermans, Celik is also due to meet EU migration commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos and climate commissioner Miguel Arias Canete and security commissioner Julian King.

The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) has said it will summon and grill eight leaders who were involved in
The party said they had carried out internal investigations and identified that the eight are those responsible for the violence that rocked the rally aimed at commemorating the second anniversary of the death of Senator Otieno Kajwang.
ODM Chief Executive Officer Oduor Ong’wen however publicly named only two of the eight perpetrators but said the party will summon all and punish them.
The two named were Homa Bay Town Member of Parliament Peter Kaluma and his rival Washington Ogaga who has vowed to unseat the incumbent during next year’s elections.
The two were seen on camera engaging in a fist fight before wrestling one another to the ground in front of the charged crowd and other ODM leaders.
 
The supporters of rival leaders engaged in a heckling and shouting match with each camp trying to do the other before the scene degenerated into a physical battle.
Attempts by Homa Bay Women Representative to quell the wild crowd proved futile.
It was only after the intervention of party leader Raila Odinga who was accompanied by Mombasa Governor Hassan Joho that the unruly crowd who were hurling stones at the main dais were finally quelled.
 
Kisumu Governor Jack Ranguma sustained injuries as he tried to flee from the ensuing melee.
ODM national chairman John Mbadi condemned the incident, calling it unfortunate.
Mr Mbadi said.

World leaders from all corners of the earth are expected to converge in Havana, Cuba on Sunday to pay their last respects to one of the most divisive figures in the 20th century.
Castro who died on Friday was cremated on Saturday as per his last wishes, followed by nine days of mourning, during which the Cuban revolutionary leader remains would be displayed at memorials stretching from Havana to Santiago de Cuba.
On Sunday the last remains (ashes) of the colorful leader will be buried at the Cementerio Santa Ifigenia.
Also read :
 
A host of African leaders are expected to attend Castro burial, the towering Marxist leader was a friend in deed for the African continent and made several forays into the continent supporting its quest for independence.
In the 1970s, for instance he sent Cuban troops to Angola to support a left-wing government. Cuba also helped defeat South African insurgents in Angola and win Namibia’s independence from South Africa in 1990, He also piled pressure on the apartheid regime to release Nelson Mandela.
 
Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe president left Harare for Havana yesterday night, Equatorial Guinea ruler, Teodoro Obiang Nguema is also expected to fly to Havana for the burial.
South African president, Jacob Zuma and Kenya’s president Uhuru Kenyatta have all confirmed will attend the ceremony.
 
Internationally, Greek Prime minister Alexis Tsipras is the only European leader whose attendance was confirmed by the Cuban government according to AFP.
 
Latin American countries leaders, Correa of Ecuador, Evo Morales of Bolivia, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, Enrique Pena Nieto of Mexico, Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia and Venezuela leader, Nicolas Maduro have all confirmed they will join their Latin brothers in morning.
 
Barack Obama has not yet released any information if he will attend the burial since White house have not revealed who will lead the US delegation. Germany, Canada Spain will all send representatives to represent their respective leaders.

US President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday nominated a fierce Obamacare critic as health secretary, indicating he plans to fulfill a campaign promise to tear up the divisive healthcare reform law.
Tom Price, a congressman from Georgia and former orthopedic surgeon, “is exceptionally qualified to shepherd our commitment to repeal and replace Obamacare and bring affordable and accessible healthcare to every American,” Trump said in a statement announcing his pick for head of the Department of Health and Human Services.
President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare reform, formally known as the Affordable Care Act, has provided health coverage to 20 million Americans and pushed the level of uninsured to a historic low of less than 10 percent.
But Obamacare also caused health insurance prices to spike among other groups, and lead to declining coverage among many plans.
However, President-elect Trump has said he hoped to preserve two of the most popular features: allowing children to stay on their parents’ plans until age 26, and preventing insurance companies from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.
“There is much work to be done to ensure we have a healthcare system that works for patients, families, and doctors; that leads the world in the cure and prevention of illness; and that is based on sensible rules to protect the well-being of the country while embracing its innovative spirit,” Price said in a statement.
His nomination was swiftly criticized by Democrats, with incoming Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer calling it “akin to asking the fox to guard the hen house.”
“Congressman Price has proven to be far out of the mainstream of what Americans want when it comes to Medicare, the Affordable Care Act, and Planned Parenthood,” he said in a statement.

Myanmar’s Rohingya may be victims of crimes against humanity, the UN’s rights agency said Tuesday, as former UN chief Kofi Annan arrived in the country for a visit that will include a trip to northern Rakhine.
The army has carried out a bloody crackdown in Rakhine, and thousands of the Muslim minority have flooded over the border into Bangladesh this month, making horrifying claims of gang rape, torture and murder at the hands of security forces.
Some 30,000 have fled their homes and analysis of satellite images by Human Rights Watch found hundreds of buildings in Rohingya villages have been razed.
Myanmar has denied allegations of abuse, saying the army is hunting “terrorists” behind raids on police posts last month.
The government has lashed out at media reports of rapes and killings, and lodged a protest over a UN official in Bangladesh who said the state was carrying out “ethnic cleansing” of Rohingya.
Foreign journalists and independent investigators have been banned from accessing the area to probe the claims.
On Tuesday, the UN OHCHR said Myanmar’s treatment of the Rohingya could be tantamount to crimes against humanity, reiterating the findings of a June report.
More than 120,000 Rohingya have been crammed into displacement camps since sectarian violence in 2012, where they are denied citizenship, healthcare and education and their movements are heavily curbed.
“The government has largely failed to act on the recommendations made in a report by the UN Human Rights Office… (that) raised the possibility that the pattern of violations against the Rohingya may amount to crimes against humanity,” the OHCHR said in a statement.
Amid the mounting crisis, former UN chief Annan on Tuesday began a week-long visit to Myanmar that will include a trip to northern Rakhine.
Suu Kyi in August appointed her fellow Nobel laureate to head a special commission to investigate how to mend bitter religious and ethnic divides that split the impoverished state.
Annan has expressed “deep concern” over the violence in Rakhine, which has seen thousands of angry Muslims take to the streets across Asia in protest.
But Aye Win, a Muslim member of the Rakhine commission, defended Suu Kyi’s handling of the crisis.
“What she has inherited is a dump of rubbish, a junk yard,” he told AFP, pointing out the army retains control of security and defence under a constitution written under the former junta.
“Her hands are tied — she can’t do anything. What she is doing is trying to talk and negotiate and build trust” with the army, he added.

The World Health Organization warned Tuesday that nearly half of all people with HIV around the globe do not know they are infected, and called for broader access to at-home testing kits.
The UN health agency said that 40 percent of people with the virus that causes AIDS, or more than 14 million people worldwide, are unaware of their status, according to 2015 estimates.
That marks a huge improvement over just a decade earlier, when only 12 percent of people with HIV were estimated to know they had the virus.
But the continued lack of diagnosis, remains a major obstacle to implementing WHO’s recommendation for everyone with HIV to be offered anti-retroviral therapy, or ART.
Today, more than 80 percent of everyone diagnosed with HIV is receiving ART.
But WHO chief Margaret Chan warned that since so many people do not know their status, “millions of people with HIV are still missing out on life-saving treatment, which can also prevent HIV transmission to others.”
“HIV self-testing should open the door for many more people to know their HIV status and find out how to get treatment and access prevention services,” she said.
HIV self-testing means that people can, in the privacy of their own homes, use oral fluid or blood from a finger prick to determine their status in a matter of minutes.
WHO urges anyone who tests positive to seek confirmatory tests at a health clinic, where they can receive information about the disease and how to get counselling, as well as rapid referral to prevention, treatment and care services.
Self-testing has been shown to nearly double the frequency of HIV testing among men who have sex with men, and recent studies in Kenya found that the male partners of pregnant women were twice as likely to get tested if they were offered self-testing, WHO said.
“By offering HIV self-testing, we can empower people to find out their own HIV status and also to notify their partners and encourage them to get tested as well,” Gottfried Hirnschall, head of WHO’s HIV department, said in the statement.
Twenty-three countries currently have national policies in place supporting HIV self-testing, while others are developing such policies, but WHO warned that in much of the world wide-scale access to the tests remains limited.
The EU and WHO also reported Tuesday that one in seven people with HIV in Europe is unaware of their infection, as 2015 marked another record year for new HIV cases in the region.
Europe registered 153,407 new cases, up from 142,000 in 2014, the WHO said, a jump driven by cases in Russia and immigrants who acquired the virus after arrival.
The WHO regional office for Europe compiles data from 53 countries.

The Afghan Taliban Tuesday pledged to protect billions of dollars worth of infrastructure projects throughout the country, many of which have been stalled for years due to militant violence and insecurity.
The militant group, which has been repeatedly accused of conducting attacks against aid workers and infrastructure projects, made the surprise gesture in a statement.
“The Islamic Emirate (Taliban) not only backs all national projects which are in the interest of the people and result in the development and prosperity of the nation but are also committed to safeguarding them,” the statement said.
“The Islamic Emirate directs all its Mujahideen to help in the security of all national projects that are in the higher interest of Islam and the country.”
The statement comes after Afghan and Turkmen leaders on Monday inaugurated a railway line connecting Afghanistan to Europe through Turkmenistan.
According to the statement, the promise extends to highways, railways, as well as the $10 billion Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline project, and a multi-billion dollar copper mine known as Mes Aynak, south of the Afghan capital Kabul.
Afghan officials were sceptical of the promises.
“They inflicted more than two billion dollars worth of damage to public and private properties and infrastructure during two months of their violent campaign in Afghanistan,” Shahhussain Murtazawi, a spokesman for Afghan president Ashraf Ghani, told AFP, referring to the Taliban’s fall offensive this year.
“How could we trust them now? They have to prove their promises in action,” he added.
Decades of war have destroyed much of Afghanistan’s basic infrastructure and fostered a climate of insecurity that has put investors to flight and forced millions of Afghans to become refugees.
The new Afghan government, which came to power in 2014, pledged an ambitious series of reforms to revive the economy and attract investment, although the ongoing insecurity and violence remain a serious challenge.

A local by-election for parliament in the posh London suburb of Richmond on Thursday is threatening to turn into a mini-referendum on Brexit, with the defending MP a Brexiteer in a pro-EU heartland.
Liberal Democrat challenger Sarah Olney, whose party wants a second referendum on Brexit, is hoping the result will shock Downing Street, as the government ploughs on towards the EU exit door.
Olney is running against Zac Goldsmith, who held the seat for Prime Minister Theresa May’s Conservative Party but quit in protest after the government backed expanding the nearby Heathrow Airport.
He is now standing as an independent candidate.
“Speaking to voters, what was becoming increasingly clear was that while some people feel very strongly about Heathrow expansion, lots more people feel much more strongly about Brexit,” Olney told AFP.
“That’s really alarmed and upset people and they want to use this opportunity to send a message.”
In the June referendum on Britain’s membership in the European Union, 52 percent nationwide voted to leave.
But in the well-heeled borough of Richmond in southwest London, 69 percent voted to remain in the bloc, the 19th highest of 326 voting areas.
The 82 percent turnout, one of the highest in the UK, showed it was an issue locals felt passionate about.
The centrist and unambiguously pro-EU Lib Dems, reduced to a rump in the 2015 general election, are eyeing a comeback by filling the void for disgruntled ‘Remain’ voters.
“The things people want to talk about in this campaign are things we’ve had a very clear position on,” said Olney, meeting commuters outside Richmond railway station.
The 39-year-old accountant only joined the Lib Dems last year and was rapidly selected as their next Richmond Park candidate for the House of Commons.
Former Lib Dem leader Paddy Ashdown, 75, said Thursday’s vote could “send a message right to the heart of Downing Street”.
“Richmond can speak for the people of Britain, the millions who want the government to change course and don’t want a hard Brexit. If they vote Liberal Democrat, that’s a message Downing Street will hear,” he told AFP on the campaign trail.
However, the Lib Dems face a tough task in overturning Goldsmith’s majority. Both the Conservative and Brexit-cheerleading UKIP parties are giving him a clear run.
Goldsmith won Richmond from the Lib Dems in 2010 and retained it in the May 2015 general election with 58 percent of the vote.
Bookmakers have Goldsmith as the 1/3 favourite, with Olney 5/2, and then the main opposition Labour candidate at 200/1. Five others are also standing.
Wealthy, suave, affable and soft-spoken, 41-year-old Goldsmith is Brexit royalty.
He is the son of the late tycoon financier Jimmy Goldsmith, whose high-spending Referendum Party, calling for a vote on UK-EU relations, got the anti-EU bandwagon rolling.
Zac Goldsmith made a bid for London mayor in May but he was beaten by Labour’s Sadiq Khan and was criticised for the tone of his campaign, often focusing on Khan’s Muslim faith.
AFP sought an interview with Goldsmith but he is focusing on private grassroots campaigning.
And his understated, local approach seems to have won him support around Richmond.
“There’s a lot of loyalty to Zac round here,” said Jane McCready, 52, who sat enjoying a hot drink overlooking the River Thames.
But she added that Brexit was an issue: “I do have friends who are using this as another vote for ‘Remain’ (in the EU) by voting Lib Dem.”
However, Freddie Gates, 79, from Richmond, said he had voted in June to stay in the EU but now would be backing Goldsmith.
“The majority of the country said out, so you go along with it,” he said.
But local surveyor Roy McClure, a lifelong Conservative, was so furious about the lack of a Tory candidate that he considered standing himself, before backing Olney.
Typical Richmond voters — soft Conservative, pro-EU and anti-Heathrow expansion — have been left “totally disenfranchised”, he told AFP.

The comedian who has shared her weight loss journey since giving birth to second born Zawadi Ber has a reason to celebrate after losing a couple of pounds.
This did not come easy as Mrs. Victor Ber has been hard at work in the gym even sharing some of her work out routines on her ‘Chapa Ilale’ segment on You Tube.
In fact she is looking even hotter than she did before she got pregnant with her tiny waist and hips that do not lie.
 
We love Teacher Wanjiku for keeping it real and taking her time in getting tight once again. Which we know cant have been that easy in a world where there is pressure in quickly getting that famous Hollywood Snapback body.
And the reactions to her weight loss have been pretty positive. Check out some of them:
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Traveling on the doomed airliner that crashed in Colombia overnight were the players and staff of a Brazilian football club about to complete a fairytale journey from unknowns to would-be South American champions.
The LAMIA charter plane went down near Medellin late Monday with 81 people aboard and so far only six are reported to have survived. At least two were said by officials to be football players.
For the Chapecoense Real team the disaster means the cruel end of a story that had been meant to climax with an unexpected chance for glory on Wednesday against Colombia’s Atletico Nacional in the first leg of the Copa Sudamericana final.
“The pain is terrible. Just as we had made it, I will not say to the top, but to have national prominence, a tragedy like this happens. It is very difficult, a very great tragedy,” club vice-president Ivan Tozzo told SporTV.
Only a few years ago Chapecoense was just another a gritty outfit in the Brazilian lower leagues, where players, unable to afford cars, took the bus to training. The stadium in Chapeco, a city of 200,000 people in the southern Santa Catarina state, didn’t have a gym.
The steep climb from minnow to contender started in 2009 when Chapecoense entered the fourth division. Back then, the team’s top goalscorer Bruno Rangel told Brazilian newspaper Lance, even the club’s bus was “was very old.”
“But a lot has changed in the club since I arrived,” he said. “There are still prejudices against the club but more because we’re from the (country’s) interior. That’s diminishing, it’s true. Every day we’re more respected.”
By 2014 the club had fought its way into the lower half of the elite table, but the side wanted more. Even at this point Chapecoense was almost ignored by its own public, with only about 7,000 people turning up to home games, according to Globoesporte website.
Chapecoense entered the running for the Copa Sudamericana for the first time in 2015 and didn’t disappoint.
In the club’s first ever international tournament, the one-time unknowns didn’t go all the way, but they performed bravely, even defeating Argentina’s famed River Plate club.
This year, things seemed to be going wrong. The coach credited with Chapecoense’s miraculous rise, Guto Ferreira, walked out and his replacement Caio Junior lost his first game against the lowly Cuiaba.
But the little team that could roared back, taking down Argentina’s Independiente and Junior de Barranquilla. They were going to the final to meet the reigning Copa Libertadores champions Atletico Nacional and no one would write them off anymore.
On the way to Colombia, the team stopped off in Sao Paulo to play the penultimate game of Brazil’s domestic league. Here they lost against Palmeiras, the team which ended the season as Brazilian champion. But there was a sense that the players had their minds on the bigger challenge awaiting them against Atletico.
“I see this is a group of winners. It’s as if God has put us precisely here today to taste this and to appreciate even more the challenge on Wednesday,” the coach said after the Sao Paulo game.
Now their dreams have met a devastating end and on Wednesday at what would have been an intriguing first leg of the Copa Sudamericana final there’ll be only silence.
Back in Chapeco, the stadium was opened up to greet grieving families and fans.
“We’re all here at the stadium to help the people connected,” said Tozzo.
“It hasn’t really sunk in yet. We have to trust in God. Out team must carry on,” he said.

On a soundstage no bigger than a large bedroom a cameraman takes up various angles to film a helicopter that isn’t there, landing in a field that isn’t there either.
Until recently, virtual reality was the preserve of the gaming crowd but producers say the technology is on the cusp of a boom which could change forever the way television is made.
Leading the charge is visual effects studio CBS Digital, which has developed “Parallax,” a VR system which could potentially do away with on-location filming altogether.
The company has laser-scanned endless parts of the United States, overlaying the geometry with hi-res images to produce fully explorable, 3D virtual sets into which real actors can be embedded.
Back at CBS Television City in Los Angeles, two actors can exchange dialogue in a room covered with green screens and optical tracking cameras dotting the ceiling.
But what the showrunner sees on his camera screen is his two stars walking hand-in-hand around a photo-realistic Eiffel Tower or leaning over a perfectly rendered Niagara Falls.
“The biggest advantage is to take away traditional restrictions that filmmakers come up against,” Craig Weiss, executive creative director of CBS Digital, told AFP on a recent visit to the studio.
“And that would be the arduous task of going to different locations, shooting in the middle of the night. You’re able to bring the world to the stage, have a lot more flexibility and get more work done.”
The problems “Parallax” solves for film and television makers are numerous. But the most important perhaps is cash — or not having enough of it to bring ideas to life on the screen.
A big proportion of any production budget goes on securing locations and filming in them. The costs spiral when you have to wait until it stops raining, or until the light exactly matches yesterday’s shoot.
The virtual sets being made available by “Parallax” allow directors to get through something like three weeks’ worth of traditional location work in a day, says the studio. The size of film crews, too, can be cut in half.
According to Weiss, a crew of a handful of technicians working with the system recently captured two blocks in New York — every nook and cranny, from every angle, in under 14 hours.
“After an initial investment… the cost of using a virtual set can, in some cases, literally save 100 percent of the costs of on-location shooting,” said CBS Digital executive producer George Bloom.
Bloom, who was vice president of creative content at Walt Disney Pictures and has 14 years’ experience as a director, says “Parallax” hands control back to the filmmaker.
“When you’re a director, sometimes you feel like you don’t have control because you’re throwing all this vision that you have into a visual effects company’s hands,” he tells AFP.
“You have no idea what it’s going to look like until five or ten days later.”
Fox’s “The Last Man on Earth” and ABC’s “American Housewife have both started using “Parallax.”
CBS Digital already provides a variety of cutting edge visual effects for Amazon’s “Transparent” as well as Netflix originals “Daredevil,” “Stranger Things” and “Jessica Jones.”
The only restrictions on what VR can achieve for television is the limits of the human imagination, it says.
The newest generation of VR was ushered in by an American teenager called Palmer Luckey, who in 2010 built a prototype of a headset that would eventually become the Oculus Rift.
Luckey, now 24 and worth $700 million, raised pledges through Kickstarter to manufacture the Oculus VR, bringing it to the attention of Facebook which paid $2 billion for the company in 2014.
Since then, gamers have reveled in the emergence of HTC Vive — a partnership between Taiwanese tech firm HTC and the games company Valve — and Samsung’s Gear VR.
The technology is in its infancy although developing fast, and for CBS Digital, the implications for television could hardly be more profound.
The eventual goal is that anyone with a good idea and the requisite storytelling skills — regardless of their access to big budgets — will have “Hollywood in a box,” says Bloom.
“A soundstage is just a nice, comfortable place to work, but it can be Paris, New York, the future,” said Bloom.

Reports going round on social media say that the man was hit by a matatu which was speeding to escape the traffic built at the Moi Avenue around lunch time. Unfortunately the white man was caught off guard as the vehicle run him over as he was crossing the zebra crossing. 
 
After the accident the matatu driver is said to have escaped on foot leaving behind the vehicle and the man lying on the road as reported by Tuko. This is however one of the many unreported cases of the rowdy matatu’s running over people in the streets of Nairobi.
 
The matatu culture is taking a horrible turn as many young drivers feel the need for speed, harassing most people while crossing. Most drivers no longer recognize the Zebra crossing zone and this has left many people hospitalized and dead for the carelessness that of such
Anyway, the matatu is currently in police custody as they trace the owner and the driver of the matatu. More details  to be released soon.

In a bid to cushion the Kenyan economy from upsets before the 2017 general elections, the private sector have invited the government to plan in advance after all failure to plan is planning to fail right!
The private sector, state officers and elected leaders will meet in Mombasa this week for talks on ensuring next year’s August general elections is peaceful.
A communication letter from the Kenya Private Sector Alliance sent to MPs inviting them to the December 1-3 retreat in Mombasa requests the pleasure of the lawmakers to ensure a smooth peaceful general election.
“ the letter reads.
 
Due to political campaigns and rhetoric’s which carry the risk of promoting tribal hatred leading to clashes which ultimately undermines investor confidence and threaten national security and stability resulting to the economy taking a hit.
Agencies charged with overseeing elections, such as the IEBC, the Registrar of Political Parties, the Supreme Court and security agencies, have all been invited to the event.
 
Due to the hard stance many politicians take without mentioning the tribal mobilization every election year, all business normally come to a standstill resulting to billions of losses.
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Farming which is one of Kenya’s main backbone of the economy usually take a big hit as farmers adopts a wait-and-see attitude or some even leave areas which they have invested heavily until the outcome of the election is clear.
Tourism is another venture which also greatly suffers whenever electioneering period is around the corner, since foreign visitors avoid visiting Kenya for fear of post-election violence.
A slowdown in economic activity obviously has a knock-on effect which ends up affecting everybody, including lower tax revenue, which means there are less resources to deliver services.
 

I have just got the right answers or rather Charlie Nicholas has- he’s a former Arsenal player and a football expert now with Sky sports. And guess what his first prediction is? That Man United will win; can you imagine that? The same team which has drawn 4 times at home in as many matches and is playing with West Ham, the same team they drew with over the weekend.
Considering their manager has even been banned and charged with improper conduct by the Football Association, I doubt they have any chance of sailing through against West Ham. But what do I know, probably Charlie Knows best.
I can agree with him that Liverpool will surely win. With their current form, Leeds will surely be a walk in the park so that’s definitely a team worth putting your money on. Placing your money on more than 2.5 goals being scored is also a valid option as Liverpool has been terrorizing most of their opponents with more than 3 goals nearly every match.
 
As for Arsenal, this is a very sticky situation as they have been on a constant spree of draws. They however got a big boost over the weekend after they beat Bournemouth 3-1. That is of course enough confidence to last them a week I think. But wait, Southampton also won and considering they lost to Arsenal in the premier league, it’s highly likely they might be looking to revenge. Again hold up, Arsenal hasn’t lost since May and they might be looking to keep that in check.
Okay, I give up on Arsenal. Charlie however thinks that they will win with a 3-2 margin and Giroud will be the first to score despite him failing to secure a position in the starting team. However, Arsenal Manager Arsene Wenger has a habit of rotating his squad for the EFL Cup. Chances are, he will rest Alexis Sanchez who has been a regular starter for the number 9 position and grant a rare start for the French striker; Hmmmmm…..
Now with those high profile predictions, make your way to and scroll through for some great odds and betting options. For matches you might not be so sure, I suggest opting for live betting which gives you to make bets considering how the game looks like.
 

This was after God instructed
Shortly after, the church grew and they moved to Harvest Restaurant on Kenyatta Avenue and about 9 months after establishing their church, JCC had to move once again to a bigger location at Tintin Restaurant at the Kenyatta International Conference.
But this was just the beginning of great things to come as the church soon grew exponentially and years after its establishment, it found a new home in Ngara.
 
17 years later after the first seed was planted , the church has expanded into a 10,000+ seater church in Parklands.
 
The church has not only expanded physically but also geographically as they have opened branches in Thika, Kitengela, Eastlands and now they have a new baby on Thika Road.
Their new church is a big white tent situated on the Thika superhighway at Exit 7.
Their service is run every Sunday from 9: am to 12:00 noon by Pastor Morris and Pauline Gacheru.
 
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A herd of reindeer moves silently down the mountain, their silver coats and majestic antlers blending into the Swedish tundra as their herder leads them to their winter grazing grounds in the plains below.
The annual pilgrimage, called transhumance, takes on almost sacred meaning for Sweden’s indigenous Sami reindeer herders nowadays, as they face modern-day threats to their livelihood from wind turbines, global warming, logging, and mining.
“It’s a painful life, but the most beautiful there is,” says Margret Fjellstrom, who owns several hundred reindeer in Dikanas, a village in Sweden’s mountains 800 kilometres (500 miles) north of the capital Stockholm.
“My identity depends on this life. When a fawn is born, we forget all of our troubles,” the 30-year-old Sami tells AFP.
Every autumn, the reindeer are taken to their winter pasture in the plains by their owners, the Sami — formerly called Lapps — the only people authorised to herd reindeer in Sweden.
In Dikanas, helpers on snowmobiles and quad bikes prepare for the move by leading thousands of the animals into an enclosure.
There the fawns are marked, and the adults are separated. The fattest are sent to the slaughterhouse — their meat is considered a delicacy in the Nordic countries — while the others are sent to the forests in the plains teeming with lichen, a type of moss that makes up the reindeer’s main diet.
Margret Fjellstrom’s lasso whirls above her furred hat as she shouts out orders to her helpers. Around her waist in a sheath rests the indispensable knife used to carve the mark in the animals’ ears.
They need to move quickly. Night falls before 3:00 pm this far north, the semi-domesticated reindeer are getting stressed and the herders are exhausted from a hard day’s work.
Under the watchful gaze of a group of fascinated children, the herders lay the reindeer down and hold them still as they mark and vaccinate them.
The herders then load them onto the trucks that will take them to their winter pasture, 200 kilometres east.
In Dikanas, reindeer herding is no longer done the traditional way, on foot: the animals’ journey through the wilderness full of peat bogs, dense forests and lakes has become too perilous.
With global warming, the crossing has become more treacherous as the ice on the lakes is not thick enough to walk on yet at this time of year.
“The water (current) is strong and therefore impassable, or the ice is too fragile. A farmer from a Sami village a little further north drowned in early November,” Fjellstrom recalls.
This leaves the herders no other choice than to take to the road, even though it costs more.
Other dangers lie in wait. Forty percent of fawns die from the cold, while wolverines, bears, wolves, lynx and eagles all prey on the reindeer.
Fjellstrom estimates her losses in 2015 at 250,000 kronor (23,400 euros), despite the damages paid by local authorities to compensate for her reindeer lost to predators.
“Sweden has decided to protect its species to diversify its wildlife. That’s good, but is it fair that I have to pay for it?,” she asks.
The ancient Sami practice of reindeer herding also faces other challenges.
Climate change has brought alternating periods of freezing and thaw throughout the winter season, building up thicker layers of ice that prevent the reindeer from reaching their lichen and forcing herders to supplement their diet with costly fodder.
The reindeer are also frightened by the roar of wind turbines and the din of machinery used in the encroaching logging and mining industries, prompting breeders to increasingly file lawsuits to protect their livelihood from these obstacles.
“Every generation of breeders has its cross to bear. For my father’s, it was Chernobyl,” Fjellstrom says, noting that the fallout from the 1986 nuclear catastrophe in Ukraine poisoned the moss and lichen in Sweden.
Although 30 years have passed since then, some reindeer in the Arctic are still radioactive.
To make ends meet, Fjellstrom works in the off-season as a hotel receptionist and her husband works in the forestry sector. Until April, when they take the reindeer back to the mountains.
Sweden has 4,600 reindeer owners for just over 250,000 animals, according to the Sami Parliament.
Semi-domesticated reindeer can be found across the northernmost part of Europe, and are raised for their meat, pelts, and antlers, which are used to make handicrafts. Wild reindeer also roam freely in forests, mostly in Norway.

In a recent post she shared through her gram, the TV personality revealed that she was not planning to get married when she was in her teenage years. Her main goal was just to get a baby but not settle as someones wife.
 
Anyway, a few years down the line she met Mr Gichuru who turned her life around and the lass is happier than ever that she met a man who completes her in every way.
She is currently on vacation with her husband as they celebrate their 17 wedding anniversary. Checkout a photo of the couple cuddling up below:

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Julie Gichuru is back on air with a new show dubbed Shinda which he hosts alongside Jalango. The show airs every Sunday starting at 8:00 pm.

Ukraine on Tuesday unveiled the world’s largest moveable metal structure over the Chernobyl nuclear power plant’s doomed fourth reactor to ensure the safety of Europeans for future generations.
The gigantic arch soars 108 metres (355 feet) into the sky — making it taller than New York’s Statue of Liberty — while its weight of 36,000 tons is three times heavier than the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
The 2.1-billion-euro ($2.2-billion) structure sponsored by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has been edged into place over an existing crumbling dome that the Soviets built in haste when disaster struck three decades ago.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko was visibly proud at his impoverished and war-torn country’s ability to deal with one of the worst vestiges of its Soviet past.
“Many people had doubts and refused to believe that this was possible,” Poroshenko told the festive ceremony held in front of the gleaming new dome.
“But my friends, I congratulate you — yes, we did it!”
Radioactive fallout from the site of the world’s worst civil nuclear accident spread across three-quarters of Europe and prompted a global rethink about the safety of atomic fuel.
Work on the previous dome began after a 10-day fire caused by the explosion was contained but radiation still spewed out of the stricken reactor.
“It was done through the super-human efforts of thousands of ordinary people,” the Chernobyl museum’s deputy chief Anna Korolevska told AFP.
“What kind of protective gear could they have possibly had? They worked in regular construction clothes.”
About 30 of the cleanup workers known as liquidators were killed on site or died from overwhelming radiation poisoning in the following weeks.
The Soviets sought to try to cover up the accident that was caused by errors during an experimental safety check and its eventual toll is still hotly disputed.
The United Nations estimated in 2005 that around 4,000 people had either been killed or were left dying from cancer and other related diseases.
But the Greenpeace environmental protection group believes the figure may be closer to 100,000.
Authorities maintain a 30-kilometre-wide (19-mile) exclusion zone around the plant in which only a few dozen elderly people live.
One of the main problems of the Soviet-era response was the fact that it only had a 30-year lifespan.
Yet its deterioration began much sooner than that.
“Radioactive dust inside the structure is being blown out through the cracks,” Sergiy Paskevych of Ukraine’s Institute of Nuclear Power Plant Safety Problems told AFP.
Paskevych added that the existing structure could crumble under extreme weather conditions.
The new arch should be able to withstand tremors of 6.0 magnitude — a strength rarely seen in eastern Europe — and tornados that strike the region only once every million years.
Kiev has complained that European assistance was slow to materialise.
The EBRD found 40 state sponsors to fund a competition in 2007 to choose who should build the massive moveable dome.
A French consortium of two companies known as Novarka finished the designs in 2010 and began construction two years later.
The shelter was edged towards the fourth reactor in just under three weeks of delicate work this month that was interrupted by bad weather and other potential dangers.
It will later be fitted with radiation control equipment as well as air vents and fire fighting measures.
The equipment inside the arch is expected to be operative by the end of 2017.
“Only then will we begin to disassemble the old, unstable structure,” State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine’s head Sergiy Bozhko told AFP.
But he said no timeframe had yet been set for the particularly hazardous work of removing all the remaining nuclear fuel from inside the plant or dismantling the old dome.
Novarka believes that its arch will keep Europe safe from nuclear fallout for the next 100 years.

Narc Kenya leader Martha Karua seems to have finally set aside her personal difference with President Uhuru Kenyatta after she warmly welcomed him to her home county of Kirinyaga.
Karua was at hand to receive both Uhuru and his deputy William Ruto during his tour of the county.
The usually tough talking Karua was all smiles as she joined other local leaders in welcoming the president.
Conspicuously absent was former Devolution Cabinet Secretary Anne Waiguru who also hails from Kirinyaga.
in a titanic battle as they seek to oust incumbent Joseph Ndathi and aim to become Kenya’s first ever female governor.
The former CS welcomed the late entry of Karua in the governorship race but exuded confidence of defeating her and all the other aspirants vying for the position during the next elections next year.
 
Karua declared she will vie on her Narc Kenya while Waiguru will contest it on the Jubilee Party ticket.
Earlier last month, Karua declared that he will support President Uhuru Kenyatta’s 2017 re-election bid.
However, she came out a week later and .
Speaking on Citizen’s Cheche show, Karua said she did not declare her support of any presidential candidate in the 2017 elections.
She said in the show that the media misrepresented her statement since like any other Kenyan her presidential choice is a secret.
Upon meeting at Kerugoya town, President Kenyatta and Karua hugged warmly in an apparent sign of things to come.

Following the arrest and subsequent detention of KTN journalist, Doreen Mbira in Uganda for allegedly taking photos, of the Kasese massacre in Uganda.
The massacre has already left 62 civilians dead and 16 soldiers and counting. Following the incident Kenyans erupted in anger and disbelief that journalists can still be targeted, intimidated and even killed in the pearl of Africa up to this age.
 
But Uganda despite its numerous challenges and random crackdowns of  media houses, is still not even among top five most dangerous countries to work as a journalist in Africa .
Also read :
Here is the dreaded list.
 
5. Eritrea. Ps 180
Out of 180 countries surveyed, Eritrea emerged as the deadliest place to work as a journalist. At position 180 according to the reporters without borders report, 2016. The dreaded North Korea even beat this African country. For more than 20 years, Eritrea has been under President Issayas Afeworki dictatorship, where free media is unheard off, At least 15 journalists are currently detained, some of them held incommunicado, Eritrean journalist Seyoum Tsehaye has been missing for 15 years.
4. Sudan. Ps 174
President Al Bashir has ruled the once largest country in Africa since 1989 with an iron fist. Journalists are arrested arbitrary by the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) media houses is censored and Journalists caught in the line of their work are subjected to interminable judicial proceedings with long, long jail sentences.
3, Djibouti, Ps 172
 
There is only one independent media house in Djibouti and it even does not operate from the country. Judicial harassment, illegal searches, exorbitant fines resulting in detention for non-payment is but the daily life of a Djibouti journalist.
2, Equatorial Guinea, Ps 168
Ruled by Teodoro Obiang Nguema for the past 37 years the country enjoys all pleasures of an authoritarian regime from tight control of the media and prior censorship. In practice, it is impossible to criticize the president and the security forces.
1. Somalia, Ps 167
 
Years of instability, non-existence government structures, corruption and extremism have created ample room for somali Journalists to be persecuted by both the government and the Al-Shabaab militia. Two journalists have already been killed this year alone.
So back to the land of Matoke, how does it fair? Museveni has ensured that Uganda will not be ‘ashamed’ and stands at position 102 out of 180. As Doreen incident proofs, Acts of intimidation and violence against journalists are an almost daily occurrence in Uganda. Journalists have been suspended, stripped of their equipment or badly beaten by ruling party members or security agents.
 

Just the other day we heard MPs were fighting at the office of Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery and now the ministry’s PS has been sentenced by the high court.
Also read:
PS Karanja Kibicho has been sentenced to three sentenced to three months in prison a shocking court ruling handed down today by high court judge.

 
Kibicho was handed the jail term for contempt of the court; he repeatedly failed to appear before the court and he disobeyed previous orders in a compensation case of a torture victim.
The Interior PS had been ordered to pay Kes 2.6 million in compensation to Nyayo House torture victim, Michael Danson Mahugu.
Mr. Mahungu moved to court 13 years ago and the court recently awarded him the Kes 2.6 million which was to be paid by the Interior Ministry.
High court judge George Odunga directed the Inspector General of Police, Joseph Boinnet, to immediately arrest the defiant Interior PS.
 
It however remains to be seen if Kibicho will be arrested as thrown in prison as it’s not the first time a court has ordered the police to arrest him but nothing happened afterwards.
Kibicho is a living evidence of blatant impunity, he’s simply untouchable.

The UN said Tuesday that its food agency had postponed the start date for a controversial post handed to a former Peruvian first lady who is facing money-laundering charges at home.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization “postponed the assumption of functions by Ms. Nadine Heredia Alarcon as Director of the FAO Liason Office in Geneva, in view of current procedural developments in Peru,” it said in a statement.
The UN agency, which is headquartered in Rome, said it had informed the Peruvian government of its decision on Monday.
“FAO will continue monitoring the situations of Ms. Heredia, who will remain a FAO employee, with the aim of identifying appropriate measures to apply in the specific circumstance at hand,” the statement said.
The appointment had sparked outrage in Peru, where Heredia is accused along with her husband, former president Ollanta Humala, of laundering $1.5 million (1.4 million euros) allegedly given to fund his 2006 and 2011 presidential campaigns.
Peru’s foreign ministry said last week it had complained to the FAO’s representative in Peru “against a decision that could be interpreted as interference in a judicial investigation in Peru”.
Heredia, who is believed to be in Rome, recently had a travel ban against her lifted, only to see a judge on Saturday order her back to the country within 10 days, and to quit her FAO job.
Humala, who left office in July after his term ended, was ordered not to leave the country as of last week.
Prosecutors believe the laundered funds came from the government of Venezuela’s then-president Hugo Chavez and two large construction firms in Brazil.
If found guilty, the couple face between eight and 10 years in prison.
FAO stressed in its statement that at “no point did it intend to interfere in Peru’s internal political or judical affairs, over which Peruvian authorities have the sole authority.”
It maintained meanwhile that Heredia had been hired on merit, and said it “considers that the basic principle that a person is presumed innocent until proven otherwise must be maintained and followed.”
FAO did not say whether the immunity protections that come with all high-level UN postings would be lifted in Heredia’s case.
Last week, Swiss authorities told AFP that such protections shield holders from arrest, detention and any form of prosecution.

Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel said Britain cannot “have its cake and eat it” and ruled out any transitional Brexit deal with the EU if negotiations are not completed in two years.
As the British government distanced itself from a memo including the aim to have the best of both worlds, Bettel told AFP in an interview that Britain could not pick and choose what it wanted.
“They want to have their cake, eat it, and get a smile from the baker, but not the other things,” Bettel said on Monday evening in his office in Luxembourg.
“There are European values which cannot be separated. No cherry-picking.”
The comments from the centre-right Bettel come as EU leaders step up warnings that Britain cannot expect to keep access to the single market while limiting immigration by European citizens.
British Prime Minister Theresa May has promised to start the two-year divorce process in March 2017 but has not set out her goals, while EU leaders have refused to negotiate until she triggers Brexit.
However in a glimpse of what the British strategy could be, a photographer spotted a memo in the hands of a lawmaker’s aide leaving the Department for Exiting the European Union on Monday which included the aim to “have cake and eat it”.
It is the latest in a series of culinary Brexit metaphors with British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson having said “my policy on cake is pro-having it and pro-eating it” and EU President Donald Tusk saying last month: “There will be no cakes on the table for anyone, there will be only salt and vinegar.”
But the British memo also suggested Britain will fail to keep access to the European single market and will seek to keep the negotiations to two years, instead of a lengthier interim deal aimed at reducing the sudden impact of leaving.
Last week, Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny raised the prospect of a transitional deal as it would be “impossible” to finish talks within the two years.
But Bettel ruled out any “hybrid” arrangement.
“What would interim mean? That we are going make a hybrid status now? Either you’re a member or you’re not a member of the European Union,” the Luxembourg prime minister said.
“We are not going to make a status of ‘a little bit member’ or ‘not completely’, ‘pending divorced’, ‘nearly divorced’.”
“There is no in-between status, there is no hybrid status between the two.”
Bettel echoed European Parliament Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt in saying that the divorce should happen before the assembly’s next election in May 2019.
“It would be odd to have British candidates at the European elections who will serve for only six months,” he said.
The wealthy duchy of Luxembourg, squeezed between France, Germany and Belgium, remains influential as one of the union’s six founding member states despite having the second smallest population of any EU state.
While Luxembourg has rolled out the red carpet for businesses that might want to relocate from Britain, Bettel insisted neither his country nor the EU would benefit in the long-term.
“Those are grocer’s calculations — it is not good for Europe, it is a loss when you see the latest figures for Britain, and it’s a loss for the European Union,” he said.
The rising tide of populism reflected by Brexit, Donald Trump’s US election victory and French far-right leader Marine Le Pen’s riding high in opinion polls are all warning shots for Europe, Bettel said.
Brexit “is the first step in disunity”, said Bettel, 43, who last year became the first EU leader and second in the world to enter into a gay marriage, adding that it “must be a sign for us all”.
On the possibility of a Le Pen victory, he said French voters “must make their choice with their soul and their conscience, but they should think carefully to make sure they don’t fall into a trap”.
As for Trump, who has alarmed Europe with threats to scale back the US commitment to NATO, Bettel added: “I hope and I think that president Trump will be less bad than candidate Trump.”

Ravindra Jadeja’s sparkling allround performance helped India secure an unassailable 2-0 lead over England as the home side cantered to a comprehensive eight-wicket win in the third Test on Tuesday.
Top-ranked India powered past the 103-run target in the final session of the fourth day in Mohali with recalled opener Parthiv Patel (67 not out) hitting the winning runs.
Left-handed Jadeja scored a career-best 90 in India’s 417-run first innings total before finishing with a match haul of four wickets to be named man-of-the-match.
India’s road to victory was smooth despite Chris Woakes striking early to send back opener Murali Vijay for nought.
Patel and Cheteshwar Pujara (25) then put on an 81-run partnership to enable the hosts to register their second straight win of the five-match series.
The first Test in Rajkot ended in a draw before India won the Visakhapatnam game by 246 runs.
Patel, returning to the Test side after an eight-year gap, struck 11 fours and a six off 54 balls on way to his fifth Test half-century.
Skipper Virat Kohli, who was at the other end when stumps were drawn, hugged Patel to celebrate his team’s well-earned victory.
It was the steely lower-order resistance from the Indian batsmen in the home side’s first innings and a combined effort by their bowlers that set up victory for the Kohli-led side.
Jadeja’s knock surpassed his previous-best of 68 he made against the same opposition at Lord’s in 2014.
Ravichandran Ashwin, who claimed three wickets in England’s second innings, also hit 72 with three other Indian batsmen making half-centuries.
The Indian lower-order contributed 213 runs to the total score in their first innings after the hosts were reduced to 204-6 following a fightback by the England bowlers on the second day.
“I think we got in a bit of a bother on the second day but the belief inside the dressing room was tremendous,” said Ashwin.
“We always backed the lower order to get a lot of runs. We tell ourselves that we are capable of making 125-150 runs. And I think we put up a stellar show.”
After securing a crucial 134-run first-innings lead, India bowled out England for 236 despite defiant half-centuries from Joe Root (78) and Haseeb Hameed (59 not out).
Teenager Hameed, who impressed on debut with an 82-run knock in the drawn first Test in Rajkot, registered his second Test fifty in only his third game.
But the Indian bowlers always held the upper hand with paceman Mohammed Shami instrumental in wiping out the tail in both innings with his lively pace.
One of his bouncers even struck Woakes’s helmet grille, breaking a portion of the protective gear, before he dismissed the batsman off the next ball.
England can take positives from Ben Stokes’ five-wicket haul in India’s first innings, while leg-spinner Adil Rashid is the leading wicket-taker in the series with 18 scalps.
England skipper Alastair Cook admitted his side squandered the advantage of winning the toss after scoring a below-par 283 in the first knock.
“It was a good toss to win but if you get bowled out for 280-odd you won’t win games,” said Cook.
“You need to get 400 on this pitch, at least. It has been a frustrating four days. Credit to India, they outplayed us.”
Stokes, who was reprimanded for his argument with Kohli on the opening day, added spice to the proceedings with a sealed lip gesture after the Indian skipper’s dismissal.
Kohli reciprocated in equal measure when he put a finger on his lips after Stokes lost his wicket in England’s second innings.
The action now shifts to Mumbai with the fourth Test scheduled to start on December 8.

The mobile App revolution is here and it’s taking over the digital airspace by storm.
Applications like Uber, Curb and Lyft have revolutionized transport across the world with the new inventions throwing off traditional taxi hailing trends and becoming global transport trendsetters .
And owing to the massive success of the inventions, applications like Uber have won great Awards and received massive accolades all across the world.
Founded 7 years ago by Travis Kalanick and Garret Camp, the Uber technology has spread it’s tentacles in 66 countries and 507 cities worldwide as we speak.
And has amassed a mind-boggling revenue that stands at an astounding $1.5 billion.
Tech creators world over have also been working hard to make the service delivery and market reach easier all across the world.
From Kenya to France, Egypt to Thailand, Germany to Brazil, techies have been toiling all day and night producing amazing creations that have not only penetrated the market but also heavily impacted consumers.
Every now and then, one of the biggest technology and finance companies in the world, Tech Live America, gets to rate and review some of the best and newest mobile apps that are revolutionizing the industry.
The latest review and ranking sees a Kenyan app get to be placed not just in the top ten of the best apps of 2016 so far but also in the coveted top five realm.
 
, a mobile invention created by brilliant Kenyan minds is some sort of a tours and travel complete guide that opens up Africa’s biggest and best destinations with just one single touch of your smartphone.
From the comfort of your home, can easily tell you the best places to spend a night this Christmas, the best tourism locations to hit this Christmas, the rankings and charges of your favorite hotel, the travel attractions of over five East African countries as you listen to over 100 radio stations on the app as well.
also has a messaging platform that sees users chat anonymously and share their different experiences from all around East Africa.
It’s an app that has swept Nairobi and continues to blow away East Africans, from the shores of the Dar Es Salaam to the hills of Kampala.
In the latest Tech World America ranking, NikoHub Bopit has been proudly placed at Number 4 out of ten of the best and most amazing mobile applications of 2016.
Other apps that have been highly ranked and hugely recognized include  Citymapper, Tube Map and Hype.
Here is the full list. 1.
You can get yourself the Nikohub Bopit App by clicking .

A (KCSE) is recuperating at a Narok County hospital after drinking a lethal chemical meant for a Chemistry practical at the school.
The student can no longer continue with his KCSE examinations since he lost his sight after drinking the ethanol laced lab chemical.
The student was supposed to sit for Biology paper on Monday but was unable since apart from blindness, he could also neither eat nor speak.
Speaking from his hospital bed, the 18-year-old student confessed that he along with several of his friends consumed the ethanol last Friday after sitting for their Chemistry paper.
 
According to the Nation, the student was taken to the Narok Cottage Hospital before being referred to the Nakuru Level Five Hospital.
The health officials however said the student was responding well to treatment and was given beer as an antidote to neutralise the ethanol he had taken.
They said the student was in stable condition and there was a high chance of him regaining his sight since he was already attended to by an eye specialist.
In October, a 17-year-old student from Nyeri who had lost his sight after consuming ethanol from his school’s laboratory regained his sight after being treated at an Othaya hospital.
The student from Kenyatta Mahiga High School is said to have taken the chemical after a chemistry session.
Following an initial diagnosis, it was initially feared he would be permanently blind but he later regained his sight.

Through her Facebook page, Mukami Mwaura, said that the song has absolutely no meaning and no impact to a Christian.
 
The message in the song is flat and as much as there is pressure to release songs…this time around mama Wambo and Willy Paul disappointed and there is no sugar coating this for anybody.
The lady went further to sarcastically say that as much as the song is poor in terms of lyrics, it will somehow win an award (I mean haven’t we seen this before?)
Also Read:
Anyway, Size 8 and Willy Paul have been having a hard time since they released . Just recently baba Wambo (Dj Mo) came out to defend his wife’s new song after it received a hostile response all over social media and mainstream media. The DJ urged people to stop pointing fingers and focus on the message, however till date most people are still trying to figure out the meaning of the song.
It is however receiving massive airplay in radio stations and clubs, meaning that the artists did not waste their energy recording it.
 

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas’s Fatah party opened its first congress in seven years Tuesday as the 81-year-old seeks to fend off opponents while talk of who will eventually succeed him mounts.
The election of members of Fatah’s parliament and its central committee beginning Friday will signal the direction the oldest Palestinian party will take at a time when Abbas is weakened by his own unpopularity and internal dissent.
Abbas, whose position as party head is not threatened at the congress, will give an address at 6 pm (1600 GMT) on Tuesday. Some 1,400 delegates are expected.
While the ageing leader has said he has no intention of stepping aside anytime soon, talk of who will eventually succeed him as Palestinian president has intensified. He has not publicly designated a successor.
Some analysts see the congress as an attempt by Abbas to marginalise political opponents, including longtime rival Mohammed Dahlan, currently in exile in the United Arab Emirates.
Jibril Rajoub, a former intelligence chief, current head of the Palestinian Football Association and Fatah central committee member, said it will also provide an opportunity to update the party’s structures.
“The system from the 1960s no longer works in 2016,” he told AFP.
“We have to take into account the current circumstances. The current system was created when we were in the diaspora and we are now on national soil. It was put in place at a revolutionary stage. Now we have a state.”
Saeb Erekat, Palestine Liberation Organisation secretary general and Fatah central committee member, said the congress will allow the party to “choose leaders for the next stage.”
But the congress also comes at a difficult time for the push to create a Palestinian state, with the cause having been overshadowed by other crises in the region.
The incoming Donald Trump administration in the United States has also signalled its policies will be far more favourable to Israel, likely vetoing UN Security Council resolutions on the conflict it opposes.
Peace efforts have been at a complete standstill since a US-led initiative collapsed in April 2014.
Israel is concerned that US President Barack Obama may take some sort of action related to the conflict before he leaves office in January, but his intentions remain unclear.
In an op-ed published in the New York Times on Tuesday, former US president Jimmy Carter called on Obama to recognise a Palestinian state before his term is up.
The congress also comes with Fatah and its Islamist rival Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip, still deeply divided. Fatah dominates the Palestinian Authority, which runs the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Israel has prevented dozens of Fatah members in Gaza, which is under an Israeli blockade, from attending the conference, said party spokesman Mahmud Abu al-Hija.
Israeli authorities did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Israel controls all borders of the Palestinian territories apart from the Gaza-Egypt frontier.
Abu al-Hija said an objective of the congress, due to run at least five days, is to determine how to act in the face of stalled peace negotiations.
Peace initiatives being promoted by France and Arab nations will be discussed, as will the possibility of introducing a UN Security resolution against Israeli settlement building in the West Bank.
Fatah is the main component of the PLO, created in 1964 in Jerusalem, which brought together the main Palestinian nationalist movements of that time.

This is because he seemed very lean like someone who was battling a serious case of melancholy. With many concluding that he was slightly-depressed after his very public split from the TV goddess.
 
And that is why an interviewer on decided to ask him what led to the weight loss.
he asked the interviewer seemingly puzzled by the question.
 
The interview went on to disclose that he had been seeing Dennis on TV and he looks slimmer than he was before.   The other interviewer asked.
To which Dennis replied with he said meaning the brawny Dennis Okari was as a result of not working out.
So the reason he is looking skinny right now is because he has been hitting the gym.
Also Read:

Chinese football club Shanghai Shenhua named former Uruguay international Gustavo Poyet as their new coach on Tuesday, after cutting ties with his Spanish predecessor Gregorio Manzano despite finishing fourth in the Chinese Super League.
Poyet, 49, was himself sacked earlier this month by struggling Spanish outfit Real Betis.
Shenhua announced that the one-time Real Zaragoza, Chelsea and Tottenham midfielder arrived in the Chinese commercial hub on Tuesday and would begin training the team later this week.
Shenhua’s performance last season earned them a berth in the AFC Champions League but the club terminated Manzano’s contract earlier this month, citing unspecified “considerations about the team’s future strategic development and in order to achieve its objectives for the new season”.
A club announcement said it expects Poyet to “further improve on the team’s tactics and put in an outstanding performance in both Asian and domestic matches in the new season.”
The Chinese Super League has a reputation for quick turnaround of managers. Besides Manzano, former England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson was let go from Shanghai SIPG this month.
In 2012, Guangzhou Evergrande replaced Lee Jang-Soo with Marcello Lippi mid-season after the Korean coach had taken them to promotion and the CSL title in consecutive years.
Evergrande also moved swiftly to replace Lippi’s eventual successor, Fabio Cannavaro, with Luiz Felipe Scolari after the Italian had guided them to the top of the table last year.

Cheryl Kitonga rose to prominence when Mohammed Ali unmasked her as the last person to be with slain businessman Jacob Juma before he was killed.
Cheryl was immediately thought to be Jacob Juma’s mistress after Kenyans failed to find convincing answers as to why she was visiting a married man at night at his rented apartment in Parklands when his family stayed in Karen.
The lass’ used to spot an average derrière and hips when she became famous as a result of her involvement with the late tycoon.
The spotlight however gradually grew faint on Cheryl with Jacob Juma out of the picture after his burial in May 14 2016.
Then came August 10 when someone ‘killed’ Cheryl; the internet was awash with stories that Jacob Juma’s alleged concubine had been found dead at home.
Rumormongers quickly said Cheryl had been killed by Jacob Juma’s vengeful ghost that was haunting his killers.
It took Mohammed Ali’s assurance to quell the bad rumor that was taking the internet by storm.
Mohammed Ali tweeted to quash rumormongers.
Well, Cheryl is back in limelight again, this time it’s what her mama gave her that’s making Mafisi get dumbstruck with lust.
The damsel’s butt has fattened up like a plump broiler chicken injected with steroids.  Cheryl now looks a younger version of Vera Sidika.

There are many versions of Biryani out there, but the most common thing n tll the recipes you might come across, is there is always meat, rice, and lots of spices.
So I’ll share with you how I make my biryani, with little additions and subtractions that I’ve learned from YouTube videos along the way.
Biryani is not a fast meal, the meat NEEDS to marinate. So for guys who work in a 9am-5pm environment, I’d advise you try it on the weekends, holidays or if you are able to marinate the meat over night the better.
Beef/chicken- 1kg
Garlic- 1 tablespoon paste
Ginger-1tablespoon paste
Pawpaw: 1(grated)
Yogurt/ maziwa mala- 1 (if using yogurt, use natural)
Tomatoes- (preferably canned tomatoes, but you can just slice like 5)
Lime- juice of 1 lime
Tomato paste- 1 small can
Mixed spices – cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, black pepper (get full spices then you crash them, they are tastier and have better aroma) so ¾ tablespoon of each
Salt to taste
Onions-5 sliced
Potatoes- ½ kg/ 5
Oil –enough oil
 
Cut the meat in a slightly bigger than usual chunks (big is better, cooks better gets more flavor), put in a dish/bowl. Then all the spices, ginger/garlic, grated paw paw, and yogurt, then set aside to marinate. Minimum hours to marinate should be 3hrs-overnight.
You mix should look something like don’t be mean with the spices or yogurt.
 
Quarter the potatoes, dice the onions. These two you will deep fry them till crispy and well-cooked.  Dice the in circles; try making them even so they can all cook evenly, then deep fry to golden brown. Keep your eye on them, too long, they will burn.
 
Put the tomatoes in your sufuria, with oil. Put your tomatoes, fry till they become soft. Then add the paste, stir for 5 minutes you can add oil if they are sticking to the sufuria.
That’s done, add the meat marinade, mix well. Add th fried potatoes and onions. Add hot water, enough to cover the meal then low your heat, and let cook for 15minutes, occasionally checking.
 
I make mine coconut rice.
Basmati rice- 2 cups
Coconut milk- 1 packet (I buy from Nakumatt)
Oil- 2tsblespoons
Food color- (I use yellow and red)
Wash and soak the rice like 15-30 minutes. Than the usual ration of 2cups rice:4cups water, I always put a cup less.
So,2 cups water, salt to taste, oil. Let boil. Just the kawaida way you cook rice, then when water starts drying up- I add in the coconut milk. Just drizzle.
 
Put a pinch like amount of food color, use a spoon the color can stain your fingers. Dissolve in a little water, and then put on the rice. Cover the rice; let the steam do its thing.
Then serve!
 
 
 

German carmakers BMW, Daimler, Porsche and Audi and US competitor Ford said on Tuesday they would cooperate on a Europe-wide network of electric charging stations.
“We intend to create a network that allows our customers on long-distance trips to use a coffee break for recharging,” Audi chief executive Rupert Stadler said in a statement.
The firms have signed a memorandum of understanding on the joint venture, planning to begin construction of some 400 high-speed charging stations across Europe in 2017.
Completion of the network is slated for 2020.
Hybrid and all-electric cars from any manufacturer using the Combined Charging System (CCS) standard will be able to use the stations, in a move aimed at boosting growth of electric car use on the continent.
German carmakers have lagged behind some competitors when it comes to introducing electric models.
The technology remains little-used in Europe, hobbled by high prices, the short range of the vehicles and a lack of recharging infrastructure.
But recent months have seen a fresh commitment from the industry, a pillar of Europe’s largest economy, to speed up the introduction of electric cars.

Cord affiliate governors from Western and Nyanza counties have come out and strongly denied claims by Jubilee leaders that they are bankrolling Cord leader, Raila Odinga rallies and foreign trips using the county funds
Busia governor, Sospeter Ojaamong, Migori governor, Okoth Obado Cyprian Awiti (Homa Bay), Jack Ranguma (Kisumu) and Kakamega governor, Wycliffe Oparanya have distanced themselves with Garissa MP comments which he made last week.
Last week, majority leader Aden Duale claimed Cord governors give Raila a monthly stipend and sponsor his trips abroad and countrywide.
The said governors countered Duale’s claims by saying they are simply a plot to divert the public’s attention from graft cases currently rocking the national government.
This follows last week report by Auditor General Edward Ouko which revealed millions of shillings were either unaccounted for or lost across the counties in both Jubilee and opposition strongholds.
Also read :
 
Among the counties named were Migori, Kakamega, Kisumu, Siaya, Homa Bay and Vihiga, the respective counties of the said governors.  
Obado has refuted all claims that county funs was being diverted, saying no money has been lost in his administration. He challenged Jubilee MPs to prove otherwise.
he said.
However mid this year, Obado decamped from PDP and rejoined ODM where he is hoping to contest for a second term under the ODM party.
 
The good governor didn’t stop there, Obado also embarked on a project to endear himself even more closely to the ODM party, by building an ODM county office dubbed, ‘Orange House 044’ in Migori town which the ODM county party leadership rejected, saying they were not involved.
In truth they were protesting the brazen attempt by Obado, to secure if not buy the ODM certificate way before nominations had even began, why go all through this trouble? For what? It is certainly not an exercise in futility and the Office is there in all its grandeur for to see, Brick and Motar.
Orange Democratic Movement party chairman, John Mbadi later on announced that they will accept the office donation by governor Okoth Obado.
How else can the party reward such a dedicated party leader? How about a direct nomination?
 
If Duale claims may be true that the said governors are bankrolling Raila so that they can win his favor and also get the highly contested nomination certificate.
In cases whereby they are also involved in graft cases they can rely on the Influence of the veteran politician to survive any impeachment nightmare coming their way.
The only sad thing is Duale and Jubilee leaders are the worst candidates to bring this issue up, because they too are neck deep in the vice, a pot cannot all of a sudden start calling the Kettle black! can it?