Month: December 2016

Back at it! Zari Hassan has left many talking after she was pictured preparing meals for her man a few hours after delivering her son, Raiz.
 
The mum of 6 chose not to laze around waiting to heal, as most ladies would have done hours after leaving the delivering room.  Well, she is back to cooking and babysitting her babies and judging from how the lady is carrying herself chances are her son’s birth was not as painful as Tiffah’s.
Anyway, she was seen dressed in an orange ‘’ mostly worn by Swahili ladies since they cover up well. The mom of six dressed casually as she left the hospital and was even seen carrying her daughter, Tiffah in one of the photos.
But due to the strict Islam rules, the new baby boy will not be revealed until his parents through him a Aqīq party that consists of giving him a name, shaving its hair, and offering a sacrifice.
 
The Aqiqah is recommended that the new-born baby should be given either a compound name containing one of the most beautiful names of Allah.

Kabogo and Waititu will face off in the Kiambu gubernatorial race, a Kenyan court has decided.
Kiambu Governor, William Kabogo today lost his case to bar his rival, Kabete Member of parliament, Fedinard Waititu from contesting in 2017 over his alleged fake academics credentials.
Justice Joseph Onguto on Wednesday ruled that the court has no jurisdiction to deal with matters relating to leadership and integrity.
 
The governor had moved to court, seeking orders to bar Waititu from holding any public office on grounds that he has breached the Leadership and Integrity Act.
Also read :
The leadership and integrity act state that a member of parliament, governor, or a senator must have a valid university degree before vying for the seat.
Kabogo had claimed to have evidence to proof Waititu, does not have a university degree.
 
Waititu said in2013 that he has valid academic qualifications, from Punjab University in India, that make him eligible to run for Nairobi Governor.
According to waititu, he attended Dagoreti High school before flying to India where he studied commerce.
The former Embakasi member of parliament at the height of his academic credentials saga, presented certificates bearing the name ‘Clifford Ndung’u Waititu’ claiming to be his names.
 
These included his 1981 Kenya Certificate of Education, a leaving certificate from Siri Guru College in India and his degree certificate.
Also read :
Kabogo in his case to paint Waititu as an ‘academic fraud’ noted that he too studied at Punjab University yet he had never met nor seen Waititu at the prestigious Punjab University then.
 
Kabogo said he was surprised to learn Waititu went to the same school “
As of now unless the court ruling changes, Kabogo will face off with Waititu who has declared interest to dislodge Kabogo as Kiambu governor.
 

The sale of Italian giants AC Milan has been pushed back three months to March after a request by the Chinese consortium which is taking over the seven-time European champions.
Milan owner Silvio Berlusconi and Sino-Europe Sports (SES) had agreed a date of December 13 for the conclusion of a deal that valued the club at 740 million euros (then $825.4 million) and will see Milan join city rivals Inter in falling under Chinese ownership.
On Wednesday SES and Berlusconi’s holding company Fininvest agreed on a new date of March 3 following a request by the Chinese consortium, which has already made a first down payment of 100m euros to buy the Serie A giants.
Another instalment of 100m will be paid to Fininvest by December 12, according to a joint statement released by the parties, with the conclusion of the deal set for March 3.
A statement issued by Fininvest said: “Fininvest and Sino-Europe Sports have added an agreement which foresees the conclusion of the sale of AC Milan on March 3.
“The agreement, approved by the administrative board of Fininvest, provides for Sino-Europe Sports to pay a second instalment of 100m euros to Fininvest by December 12.
“The agreement on the extension, which was requested by SES, reiterates that the methods of AC Milan’s business operations until the closing date will continue to be based on the principle of shared interests.”

KTN investigative journalist, Mohammed Ali, has declared his intention to vie for Nyali constituency seat in 2017 elections.
Current Nyali Member of Parliament, Hezron Awiti Bollo, has declared interest to vie for Mombasa gubernatorial seat.
Awiti’s interest for Mombasa top seat has left an opening which has attracted a lot of aspirants. So far only two seems to be in an apex position to succeed Awiti; Said Abdalla Saido and Mohammed Ali.
Saido has taken advantage of Ali’s absence on the ground to win over Nyali electorates; the KTN anchor hasn’t resigned from his job at the Standard Group. He is still juggling between his job and campaigning in Nyali.
Saido has stepped on the gas pedal in his campaigns in Nyali as he regularly meets the electorates to listen to their problems and to sell them his ideas.
Also read:
 
Saido’s spirited campaigns in Nyali have sparked fears in other aspirants within his party who have since been calling for direct nomination slots.
 
Saido himself supports a free and fair party nomination as he is confident of making mincemeat of other aspirants.
Noticing the popularity of Saido in Nyali, Ford Kenya Secretary General Yaser Bajaber offered Saido a slot to vie for Nyali parliamentary seat on a Ford Kenya ticket.
Speaking at an event in Nyali where Mombasa governor donated 300k to boda boda operators, Bajaber said Ford Kenya was ready to give Saido a direct ticket if he is unfairly rigged in party primaries.

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A member of Britain’s House of Lords rescued from the Nazis when he was six years old, told AFP the anti-immigrant sentiment behind Brexit should not prevent child migrants being welcomed to Britain.
Nearly 80 years since he arrived from Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia, Labour politician Lord Alfred Dubs said he did not believe his adopted country has lost its willingness to help youngsters fleeing persecution.
“I think there’s general willingness to accept at least some of the child refugees, by most people, not all, but most people,” he told AFP.
“I don’t think Britain’s stupidity on Brexit should affect the principle of what we are doing.”
The June 23 referendum which saw Britons vote to leave the European Union was characterised by a fierce anti-immigration campaign.
Now 84, Dubs was behind an amendment adopted in May to allow vulnerable minors to seek refuge in Britain.
He himself arrived in Britain in 1938 under the “Kindertransport” programme which rescued thousands of Jewish refugee children from the Nazis.
The initiative saw some 10,000 children fleeing persecution in Germany, Austria and what was then Czechoslovakia brought to Britain.
“Although I argue that the case for the amendment doesn’t depend upon my background, clearly I have more of an emotional involvement with it so it helped,” he said.
“I think it helped to put the pressure on the government.”
The Dubs Amendment was passed as thousands of people were gathered at the makeshift “Jungle” refugee camp in the French port city of Calais in the hope of reaching Britain.
The sprawling camp was demolished by French authorities in October, with Britain taking in 300 of the children who had been staying there.
A further 1,600 unaccompanied minors were dispatched to shelters across France, while they wait to hear whether they too will be granted permission to go to Britain.
Since the camp was razed, the British government has announced new eligibility criteria, last month outlining how it would decide which children will have the chance for a new life in Britain.
If a child is Syrian or Sudanese, they are eligible up to the age of 15, but if they are any other nationality, that drops to 12, the guidelines say.
Children may also be let in if they are identified as being at high risk of sexual exploitation, and they are eligible up to the age of 18 if they are accompanying a sibling who meets one of the other criteria.
In addition, the interior ministry said they must have arrived in Europe before March 20, have been present in the Calais camp on or before October 24, and their transfer to the UK must be determined to be in their best interests.
Dubs described the new measures as “wrong” and said they excluded “some very vulnerable children that have come from Eritrea, Ethiopia”.
“To say ‘eligibility’ went against the letter and spirit of the amendment which the government undertook to do,” he added.
The politician is featured in a new film on refugees directed by Oscar-winner Vanessa Redgrave, who has praised Dubs for his campaigning and political influence.
“I find it impossible to believe that government ministers don’t do what he’s asking them to do,” she told AFP in an interview ahead of the “Sea Sorrow” premiere.
Both London and Paris have remained tight-lipped about the number of unaccompanied minors that will be brought to Britain.
Sources put the figure at 600 in total although France wants Britain to take more.
But Dubs appeared frustrated at the speed of the transfers, aware that elections in France next year and the influence of the far-right National Front made the situation particularly politically-charged.
“I would have thought between us we could deal with this without falling out, we could deal with it quickly and smoothly,” he said.

The Kenya Airline Pilots Association (Kalpa) has warned Kenya Airways that they risk losing more pilots to rival airlines if the staff welfare at the national carrier is not improved.
30 pilots have left Kenya Airways for greener pastures abroad in the last three months alone bringing the total to 105 in one and a half years.
Kalpa secretary general Paul Gichinga said in an interview with The Star.
By August this year, KQ has 450 pilots flying its fleet of 30 aircraft down from 525 one and a half years ago.
 
According to Gichinga, the airline needs about 490 pilots to operate optimally.
In October, after Kalpa announced that negotiations had yielded a compromise on their demands.
The association had demanded a change of management at KQ, saying they no longer had faith with the current management to steer the airline back to its former pride.
The action led to the retirement of former board chairman Dennis Awori who was later replaced by ex-Safaricom CEO Michael Joseph.
 
KQ also has a shortage of more than 150 cabin crew, Kalpa claimed, which is affecting flight schedules.
The citing poor pay, lack of promotions and unfavourable shift patterns.
The engineers said they had made the complaints for a long time but that changes had not been made.
 they complained in the letter to chairman Michael Joseph.
They added that some of their allowances were struck off and other amounts withdrawn after the national carrier sold some of its planes.

It’s an improbable love story… A match made, quite literally, in the halls of heaven and a match sustained by the very tenets that govern heaven.
Whenever Willy Paul teams up with his frequent collaborator Size 8, you can rest assured that they’re about to produce magical gems that will not only form huge conversations for weeks but also rake over a million views on YouTube.
The nature of Willy Paul and Size 8’s musical relationship transcends anything that the local industry has crafted for a long time.
One is a thoroughbred street disciple who has mastered the street language to bring you hits made specifically for the street crowd and the other is the exact female replica of the first – tenacious, calculating, streetwise, punchy and rough at the edges.
It might look like nothing beats the wonder that is Willy Paul and Gloria Muliro, a duo that has paired up severally in their musical journey but in real sense, the chemistry between Willy and Mama Wambo is really where the magic is.
No one compliments Willy Paul’s sound and urgent delivery quite like Size 8. Like him, she’s willing to bend a couple rules, go the extra mile, shock a little and keep reinventing herself.
It looks like whenever the unbreakable two hit the studio, sparks fly off immediately.
 
No one will have done a better job in the remix than Size 8.
She’s melodramatic and also very showy, a quality that gels well with what encapsulates Willy Paul – sheer showmanship.
For the entire length of his career (which isn’t that long anyway) Willy Paul has refused to just be a singer and a lyricist. Willy has put the ‘e’ in entertainment and has always done material that will not just uplift but also, entertain and definitely drive you to the dance floor.
That’s what Size 8 is all about too. Unlike her female contemporaries, most of whom take their job very seriously and prefer to record stirring worship singles that lead you to the altar, Size 8 rarely boxes herself into the corner of strict traditional-style praise and worship.
Just like her favorite collaborator, she’s an entertainer first. And Gospel singer second.
Obviously, these particular aspects of their complex packaging and interpretation of ‘Gospel music’ has always landed the duo in trouble and launched them onto the chopping board time and again.
But, together, they refuse to be shaken and to be moved, moving strongly together to record yet another opinion-splitting hit. And watch it burn like fire.
Like Jay Z and Beyonce , or Drake and Rihanna , or Mac Miller and Ariana Grande, this pair’s collaborative efforts always shoot up to the top of the charts and their chemistry while at it is never mistakable.
 
Unlike many artists who always place a caveat whenever it comes to writing together, like paying for a collabo or having to foot all the musical bills (Like in the case of DK Kwenye Beat and Anto Neo Soul) Willy Paul and Size 8 already know that they need each other and therefore, there are usually no pre-conditions or contractual obligations before the two hit the studio.
A source tells us that they even craft their songs together and the reason they gel so well, blend in their voices and verses so seamlessly is the fact that the two are actually longtime friends who don’t just come together whenever they need to record.
Their off studio chemistry too is unmistakable as the two spend huge amounts of time together either promoting their new single, going for photo shoots together or even going on stage together.
The kind of nasty beef that arose after the massive success of , a song that Willy Paul did with Gloria Muliro, is normally not present whenever he teams up with Size 8.
 
You don’t see them fighting over who has what rights, over royalties, over rights to own the song and over who gets to perform the song at what event.
That pettiness might occur when Willy gets down with another performer – but is quite absent when he works with his favorite sidekick, Size 8.
In , you can evidently see the influence that each one has imparted on the other.
And that way, they’re assured of a hit song that will immediately fly off the shelves and launch them back onto the headlines. Once again.
This excellence can also be seen on YouTube where any sing that size 8 has done with Willy Paul hits the one million views mark.
, the song that he did with Sauti Sol has stagnated at 700,000 views almost an year later yet , which is a mere two weeks old, has already crossed the 600,000 mark and has been accumulating thousands of views per hour.
I don’t what what it is between the two. But sure, whatever they’re doing, they’re doing it right.
To Willy Paul and Size 8, the perfect match of Gospel Music.

The holidays are here finally! But we are still scrambling to choose the perfect gifts for the loved ones in our lives. What do they need? What do they expect? We wait till the day before Christmas to go scramble and spend hours in shops trying to find out what to buy.
There is another way to settle the gift dilemma, pre-planning. If you have an idea of what to buy, your shopping moments will be more effective and fruitful.
So how do we choose what to buy our dear mothers?
Getting a gift voucher is one of the easiest form of gifts! You have no hustle to decide what to buy you eliminate the possibility of: if what you have bought your mum will actually like or she already has.
Gift voucher can range from a retail shop, shopping, outdoor adventures, cooking class, tech gadgets, beauty shop, spa treatment, and supermarket. You have a whole field of choices to pick from.
You give the ultimate gift plus your budget remains intact, everyone is happy.
Personal care is the most essential part of any human being. are broken down to but not limited to: shampoo, conditioner, perfume, shower puff, mouthwash deodorant, and toothpaste.
If you can get toiletries that come with a bag, the better, helps in compacting all toiletries in one so she won’t be forgetting it at any trip.
 
A is very useful, a good investment to give to anyone. You need to be particular and find out beforehand (if you already don’t know), whether she’s allergic to any metal or if she has a preference in terms of the wrist band material.
Please invest in a good watch, will last her for years. Don’t go buying knock offs on the streets because some vendor is shouting “200bob” from the top of their lungs.
If you can, get water resistant, the better: she can still wear it even if she needs to do some household chores.
 
Who does not want to get money as a gift? I know I wouldn’t.
If all fails, and you still cannot get something to buy, just Mpesa! Or send Airtel money. Very handy, let her decide what to do with the money.
Tomorrow, we look at gift ideas for giving dad.

Will he hack? It seems so considering his latest jam Micasa Sucasa which is blowing up the airwaves. On this one he collaborated with his longtime girlfriend Cashy who is equally very talented and together they have set new standards for Hip Hop collaborations in Kenya.
And more so, the guy is getting shows and getting that paper just what a rapper is supposed to do. He’s part of the lineup for the launch of Fahrenheight which is the hottest and swankiest club in Nairobi right now.
Situated along Kimathi street, it has redefined how partying in the CBD is viewed killing off the notion that Nairobi clubs don’t kick. With a little bit of class there, some ambience there and quite the right combination of dope music and great service, it’s definitely a place worth trying out.
Anyway, back to Khali…he’s headlining the launch dubbed going down on Saturday the 10 from 7 PM. He will be alongside other popular artists like Sanaipei Tande, Kristoff, Bilari and so many more. Consider funnyman Obinna being the MC then you can be rest assured it’s going to be lit!
 
Want to be part of the experience? Write a comment below and we might just consider sending you an invitation.

The baby will promote the diaper company and is currently set to appear in print advertisement campaigns and hopefully commercials.
So far the Softcare diaper has changed their packaging putting Ladasha and her mum as the new face of the product hence  replacing the adorable mum and daughter who were there before.
 

This calls for a celebration as Ladasha’s auntie posted a picture of the new package to cingratulate Size 8 and her hubby for the success of their daughter.
YES!!! Congratulations to the baby and mother for this deal. Checkout the new packaging below:
 

Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) will be closed for one hour on 12th December 2016.
As a result, flights to and from the international airport will be affected and some will be re-schedule.
JKIA will be closed temporarily to allow the Kenyan air force conduct their military drills for the Jamhuri day celebrations, to be held on 12th December.
 
Kenya airways through its twitter handle on Wednesday announced the closure.
” the national carrier tweeted.
Before later on explaining the reason behind the closure.
Kenya Airways said the one-hour drill between 11.20am and 12.20pm would affect at least nine flights.
“Schedule changes on: KQ264/265,KQ351.KQ401,KQ412,KQ434,KQ550,KQ654/655” KQ tweeted.
KQ sort to alert its passengers of the changes in their flight time.
“
Closing of JKIA is line with international practice, an aviation norm done for safety purposes in case the Kenya defense forces may need to use the airport as an alternative ground.
The Kenya Defence normally entertain the president and the public, during national day celebrations with hair raising stunts in the air, and this year’s 53rd Jamhuri is no exception.
 
The latest flight disruption comes a day afteron Monday citing poor pay, lack of promotions and unfavourable shift patterns.
A week ago,
 

Britain will help Gulf states “push back” against aggressive regional actions by Iran, Prime Minister Theresa May told the Gulf Cooperation Council in Bahrain on Wednesday in a televised address.
Iran’s alleged “interference” in the region is a central preoccupation of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council whose most powerful member is Saudi Arabia.
The Sunni Gulf monarchies and Tehran are at odds over a range of issues including the wars in Syria and Yemen.
“We must… continue to confront state actors whose influence fuels instability in the region,” May told Gulf leaders at their annual summit.
“So I want to assure you that I am clear-eyed about the threat that Iran poses to the Gulf and to the wider Middle East.”
She added: “We must… work together to push back against Iran’s aggressive regional actions.”
May said she wanted a “strategic partnership” to help boost security in Gulf countries, including defence investment and military training in Bahrain and Jordan.
The prime minister also spoke about discussions to improve trade ties with Gulf countries as Britain prepares to leave the European Union after a shock referendum vote in June to quit the bloc.
“I want these talks to pave the way for an ambitious trade arrangement” after Brexit, she said in Bahrain, which was a British protectorate for 100 years and gained full independence in 1971.
May is the latest foreign leader to address the GCC as the Gulf deepens ties with major powers beyond longtime ally the United States.
Britain, too, is seeking “stronger global ties” before Brexit, finance minister Philip Hammond said on Wednesday.
In May last year, France’s President Francois Hollande became the first Western head of state to attend a GCC summit since the bloc’s creation in 1981.
US President Barack Obama in April also joined a GCC summit in Riyadh, seeking to reassure Gulf monarchs about US overtures to Iran.
GCC leaders have expressed concern over an international agreement that lifted sanctions on Iran this year in exchange for guarantees it would not pursue a nuclear weapons capability.
Riyadh and its allies fear the pact will lead to more Iranian intervention in a region which, Gulf leaders feel, has suffered from a lack of American involvement under Obama.
King Salman of Saudi Arabia opened the summit on Tuesday with a call for a “doubling of efforts” to face regional challenges.
In October last year, Britain began building a naval base at Mina Salman, outside Manama, its first new permanent base in the Middle East in four decades.
The EU including Britain is the Gulf’s biggest trading partner, with trade flows of more than 130 billion euros ($140 billion) annually.
But almost 30 years after the Gulf states and the European Union began talks on free trade, still no deal has been reached.

Angela Merkel’s conservatives gave her an 11-minute standing ovation after handing her another term as party chief but also issued a warning in re-electing her with the worst score since she became German chancellor.
With the mixed verdict Tuesday from her party rank and file on her bid for a fourth term, Merkel embarks on her toughest election campaign weakened by her liberal refugee policy that has polarised Europe’s biggest economy.
While 89.5 percent is hardly a score to be scoffed at, it fell just short of the 90 percent of Christian Democratic Union delegates seen as a crucial threshold.
“It shows that she has lost confidence but has not fully regained it,” said Spiegel Online.
Rheinische Post daily agreed, saying that “it is clear that this chancellor is no longer strong enough to simply use ‘you know me’ to win the 2017 elections,” referring to a previous Merkel slogan.
“That attitude, which helped her in the 2013 (general election) campaign, almost led to her doom in the refugee crisis. For too long, she has trusted her party and voters to simply follow her,” it said.
Merkel’s decision last September to let in people fleeing war has become her Achilles’ heel, as public resentment mounted after more than a million asylum seekers have arrived in Europe’s biggest economy since the start of 2015.
The displeasure has been manifested in setbacks for her party in five consecutive state elections this year, as the upstart populist AfD recorded a surge of support on the back of their campaign railing against migrants.
Delegates at the CDU’s annual congress are particularly anxious to halt a further haemorrhage of supporters to the AfD, as three more state elections loom next year in the run-up to the nationwide polls.
“We’re winning few voters from the left, but we’re losing a lot to the right,” said delegate Eugen Abele, accusing Merkel of positioning the party too far left and giving room for the AfD to stake a claim to the party’s right.
Recognising the public resentment over her refugee policy, Merkel has ditched last year’s mantra of “we can do this”.
Rather, she laid out a tough stance on immigration and even called for a partial ban on the Muslim full-face veil, as she pleaded with her delegates for help in her fight for a fourth term.
Wolfgang Reinhart, CDU lawmaker in the Baden-Wuerttemberg state parliament, told AFP he welcomed the chancellor’s “new tone” stating that refugee and migration policies will become more restrictive.
But he also recognised that “we still don’t have a way to deal with the new nationalism and populism” challenge put by the AfD.
For the Green party’s parliamentary chief Anton Hofreiter, Merkel was pandering to the conservative right with her new stance.
“The CDU is leaving the liberal middle-ground and shifting right,” he told Die Welt daily.
The regional daily Lausitzer Rundschau was harsher in its criticism of the battle strategy outlined by Merkel on Tuesday, saying it “lacked the rational power to convince” and showed “no mission”.
“The chancellor and her CDU are lucky that the right in Germany hasn’t found someone as determined and unscrupulous as Donald Trump,” it said.

Nine Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) rebel leaders will not be de-registered from after the Political Parties Disputes Tribunal barred the party from striking their names off the register and declaring their seats vacant.   
The tribunal ruled that the leaders will remain in ODM until their application challenging the decision is heard.
It also directed the Registrar of Political Parties not to amend or alter the ODM membership list.
The rebels include Kwale Governor Salim Mvurya, Kisii Deputy Governor Joash Maangi, Kwale woman representative Zainab Chidzuga, Steven Kariuki (Mathare), Isaac Mwaura (nominated), John Waluke (Sirisia), Samuel Arama (Nakuru Town West), Masoud Mwahima (Likoni), Ababu Namwamba (Budalang’i) and Viwandani MCA Samwel Nyang’wara.
 
The nine moved to the tribunal after for expressing affiliation to the Jubilee party and support for President Uhuru Kenyatta’s re-election in 2017.
Through their lawyer Kioko Kilukumi, the rebels said that they were not given a fair hearing during a recent disciplinary committee meeting.
They also said that ODM has not held party elections for the last 10 years.
 
The rebels said that during the last National Executive Committee meeting at the Kasarani Gymnasium, no party officials were elected, as the meeting was disrupted by “men in black” hence ODM lacks a legally constituted committee to discipline members deemed rebellious.
On Monday, the party’s to remain as members of ODM.
National Governing Council (NGC) said the expelled members violated the ODM constitution and the Political Parties law and must now face the electorate.
ODM chairman John Mbadi said the rebels were not remorseful when they appeared before the disciplinary committee.

Syrian rebels in Aleppo city called Wednesday for an immediate five-day truce and the evacuation of civilians to other opposition-held territory in the northern province, a statement said.
The initiative, which comes after government forces seized three-quarters of the former rebel bastion in east Aleppo, was approved by all factions in the city, a representative from one group told AFP.
It calls for an “immediate five-day humanitarian ceasefire” as well as the UN-supervised evacuation of people requiring urgent medical care, who it says number around 500 people.
And it calls for “the evacuation of civilians who wish to leave besieged east Aleppo to the northern Aleppo province countryside,” where rebels still hold pockets of territory.
It rules out the evacuation of civilians to neighbouring Idlib province, where many civilians and surrendering rebels have taken refuge after leaving territory recaptured by the government elsewhere in the country.
“Idlib province is no longer a safe area because of Russian and regime bombardment,” it said.
The initiative makes no mention of the fate of the rebels remaining in the city, who have said previously they will not evacuate.
Instead, it calls for “negotiations on the future of the city” to begin after the “easing of the humanitarian situation in east Aleppo”.
Yasser al-Youssef of the Nureddin al-Zinki rebel group confirmed that the statement had been approved by all factions in east Aleppo, including Fateh al-Sham, the former Al-Qaeda affiliate previously known as Al-Nusra Front.
At least 80,000 people have already fled eastern neighbourhoods for territory controlled by the government or Kurds elsewhere in the city, according to a monitor.
More have fled south, to remaining rebel-held areas in the city.
East Aleppo fell to rebels in 2012 and has been under government siege since mid-July, with international aid now exhausted and food supplies limited.
More than 250,000 civilians were estimated to be in east Aleppo before the latest government offensive began in mid-November.
Figures for the number of rebels in the east before the offensive began range between around 8,000 to 15,000.

The betting platform has showed its financial might in the past by sponsoring countless sports teams in the country like EFC Basketball Tournament, Kenya Rugby Union, Harlequin RFC, Football Federation of Kenya, Gor Mahia FC, AFC Leopards & Nakuru All Stars.
But that is not all; the betting company is also the official Sports Betting Partner for English Premier League teams Arsenal FC & Southampton FC’s and the official Lead & Shirt Sponsor for Hull City.
 
Apart from Kenyan teams benefiting from the SportPesa sponsorship and changing the lives of jackpot winners SportPesa does not forget its employees.
This is judging from the high-class car its C.E.O reportedly owns. Spotted in DT Dobie, Ronald Karauri’s Mercedes-Maybach 600 was the belle of the ball with people breaking their necks for a peek at the 45 Million machine.
 
Judging from the price, this ultra-luxury car is not just for anybody and that is why Ronald Karauri is the 2nd person to won this car, the first being Centum’s single-biggest shareholder Chris Kirubi.
 

Friends and associates of the woman at the heart of a corruption scandal engulfing South Korean President Park Geun-Hye told a hearing Wednesday her influence extended to everything from Park’s wardrobe to senior appointments.
The impeachment-threatened Park has been accused of letting long-time confidante Choi Soon-Sil meddle in a wide range of state affairs, and of ordering aides to leak confidential documents to Choi, who has no official title or security clearance.
The president is also suspected of colluding with Choi in strong-arming major conglomerates into donating funds to two dubious foundations Choi controlled.
The scandal has sparked mass rallies across South Korea, with hundreds of thousands of protesters calling Park a “puppet” of the Choi family and demanding she resign immediately.
A major parliamentary hearing on the scandal has summoned the country’s most powerful business tycoons as well as Choi’s close associates, including a prominent K-pop video director and a fashion designer.
Cha Eun-Taek, who once made videos for “Gangnam Style” star Psy, said Choi had once asked him to recommend potential candidates for culture minister and for a presidential adviser on culture.
The names he put forward to Choi, including one of his uncles, ended up getting the jobs.
“So I thought…’What kind of person could possibly do something like this?'” Cha told lawmakers, describing Choi’s ties with Park as “extremely close”.
Cha also said Choi had often sought his written opinions on cultural issues. These were later included word-for-word in some of Park’s speeches.
Choi, whose influence over Park has led to her being called “Korea’s Rasputin”, has refused to testify to the investigative parliamentary committee despite warnings from lawmakers that she could be jailed for contempt.
Another member of her inner circle, a young designer named Koh Young-Tae whose relationship with Choi has been the subject of lurid media gossip, testified to the power Choi appeared to wield over senior administration officials.
He particularly noted her treatment of Kim Chong, a former vice sports minister who is now under arrest on charges of awarding lucrative contracts to Choi and trying to help her meddle in preparations for the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.
“Choi constantly gave orders to Kim… as if he was her personal assistant,” Koh told the televised hearing.
He also suggested Choi had controlled the president’s wardrobe choices, saying he provided Choi with about 100 items of clothing and up to 40 bags that he saw Park wearing in public for years.
At the start of Wednesday’s hearing, the chair of the parliamentary committee issued orders compelling Choi and members of her family to appear or face possible jail for contempt.
Choi had been slated to answer questions on Wednesday but refused the summons, citing health reasons and the need to prepare for her pending trial.
But Choi’s niece, seen as her close aide, made an appearance and was grilled for allegedly using Choi’s power to squeeze money from Samsung.
Samsung is accused of giving 1.6 billion won ($1.4 million) to a dubious sports foundation controlled by the niece, Jang Si-Ho, who was arrested last month for allegedly embezzling some of the funds.
Jang denied all accusations against her, saying she had only followed orders from her powerful aunt to whom she could not say no.
Samsung was the single biggest donor to Choi’s foundations, and also sent Choi millions of euros to fund her daughter’s equestrian training in Germany, in what critics describe as a bid to win policy favours.

Diamond yesterday announced that his wife Zari Hassan had delivered a baby boy at a South African hospital.
 Diamond posted.
Also read:
And just like they did when Tiffah was born last year, Diamond and Zari hid their son’s face from the public. The baby’s face is strategically hidden in all the photos that were shared online.

 
Unlike other celebrities who hide the faces of their newborn babies without any specific purpose other than hype, Diamond and Zari do it for monetary reason.
Tiffah’s face was officially unveiled on September 20 2015, some 40 days after she was born.  Her unveiling was sponsored by National Micro-finance bank (NMB) of Tanzania which paid the celebrity couple Tsh 50 million or Kes 2.3 million.
 
Tiffah was also named the brand ambassador for baby shop at Msasani City Mall and Pugu Mall in Tanazania. The two malls also paid Diamond and Zari for using their daughter’s face to promote their brands.
And once again Zari and Diamond are hiding the face of their newborn baby; brands will definitely want to sponsor the unveiling of their son’s face.

The three coaches from the English Premier League side are in Kenya courtesy of leading sports betting company SportPesa.
The week-long training session to be attended by 50 coaches from local premier league teams will be held at Kenya School of Monetary Studies, Nairobi.
 
This is the second coaching clinic and follows a similar event in May 2016 as part of SportPesa’s partnership with the EPL team.
The Arsenal coaching team will be joined on Thursday by club Legend ‘Lauren’ (Laurean Bisan Etamé-Mayer). Lauren is remembered as a key member of the ‘Invincibles’ Arsenal team that won the English Premier League with 49 games unbeaten in the 2003/2004 season. Lauren played right-back and made 241 appearance for Arsenal between 2000 and 2007.
It will be the inaugural trip to Kenya for  lead coach James Colinese and his colleague Jonny Georgiou, while it is the second time in the country for Drew Tyler who participated in the first training camp held in May.
James Colinese, Arsenal’s lead coach for the week, said: “We are looking forward to the training camp and to be working closely with club partner SportPesa to develop football in Kenya.  It’s important to be working closely with the local premier league coaches and for us to gain further understanding of their current levels and individual outlooks on the game.
Throughout the week, we will look to impart further insight and teach the key principles of ‘playing the Arsenal way’ which they can take back to their own teams.”
SportPesa CEO Ronald Karauri said that exposure to international best practices is key if Kenya is to realize its goal of reaching the football World Cup in 2022 slated for Qatar.
“We are engaging various stakeholders and our partners both locally and internationally so as to build our capacity to handle the mega tournament which we hope will be the highlight of our massive investments in Kenya’s sports,” said Karauri.
“Train a coach well and you have automatically improved the game of like 20 players at one-go. That is why we have taken a wholesome approach to ensure that our coaches also get proper lessons on what works best in this game,” he added.
Aside from being trained on talent identification, the course, which comprises of both practical and theory lessons, will also focus on defensive play and conditioning.
For the first time, the training camp will also be attended by coaches from all the 16 teams in the local womens’ premier league.

The relationship that had blossomed for over 6 years was cemented by a little girl called Ivanna and a wedding thrown at the Karen Manor.
However six months after the wedding, the Okaris were no more and Betty reverted to her maiden name Kyalo. The divorce was overloaded by rumours and speculations with curious Kenyans wondering what led to the horrible split. Some claimed that Dennis Okari had been violent with Betty while others claimed that Betty had been unfaithful and hooked up with a certain politician.
With the kind of drama that was going on, it was understandable when Betty Kyalo pulled photos of her daughter down from social media. But sweet Ivanna has made a comeback to Betty’s Page.
The screen siren shared this photo tearing up after her daughter’s great Christmas performance.
 
Betty Captioned the photo.

The reality star says that her ex rapper Prezzo, hacked her Google accounts and posted a bunch of lies.
 
In the post shared on Yola’s social media pages, we were all made to believe the two were pulling a prank…but now which is which? Anyway Michelle now says,

Their love drama has left many confused as most believe that this is part of the Nairobi Diaries script…but tumechoka already! The lass however promised to post more details come this morning and we are yet to see what she is planning to reveal.  
However, the mess might take a shocking turn if the lady decides to spill her ex fiance’s secrets, right? Anyway let us keep watching!

127 traffic police officers have been sacked from the National Police Service after failing the vetting process.
, professional misconduct, operating matatu businesses contrary to regulations, sending and receiving money from fellow police officers and receiving money from transporters and operators of breakdown businesses.
NPSC chairman Johnston Kavuludi said of the 904 officers vetted, 72 are pending investigations before the vetting results, while 26 were removed after opting not to be interviewed.
he said.
Kavuludi said that sufficient mechanisms have been put in place by the service to monitor officers who have been removed from the service to ensure they remain law abiding citizens.
 
The commission dismissed 36 officers from Coast, 23 from Western, 50 from Rift Valley and 18 from Nyanza.
The next round of the vetting exercise of traffic officers will now shift to Nairobi, Kajiado, Central, Eastern and North Eastern regions.
At the same time, the NPSC chair said that 20 officers who had been previously fired and applied for vetting review had been reinstated after passing the process.
They include Masoud Mwinyi, William Meto, William Kariuki Ngugi, Japheth Ngwata, Chacha Daniel Chacha and Festus Malinge Luruma.
Last month, the Matatu Owners Association (MOA) denied  reports that the public transport vehicles willingly give out bribes.
Their chairman, Simon Kimutai said they were threatened by the traffic officers to pay up, failure to which trumped-up charges are labelled against them, hence they had no option but to bribe the police.

Syrian government forces control all of Aleppo’s historic Old City after rebel fighters withdrew in the face of army advances overnight, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Wednesday.
The army and allied forces hold more than 75 percent of east Aleppo, a rebel bastion since 2012, three weeks into their operation to capture all of the second city.
The Observatory said rebels had withdrawn from the last parts of the Old City under their control overnight after the army seized the neighbouring districts of Bab al-Hadid and Aqyul.
“Rebels were forced to withdraw from the Old City neighbourhoods of Aleppo for fear of being besieged,” the Britain-based monitor said.
The army has made steady gains since it began its latest bid to recapture east Aleppo.
It now controls all the areas east of the historic citadel, and parts of the Marjeh neighbourhood, the Observatory said.
Overnight, the army carried out heavy shelling of the Al-Zabdiya neighbourhood and other territory still under rebel control in the southeast of the city, the Observatory said.
It said at least 15 people, including a child, were killed in government fire on east Aleppo on Tuesday.
Three children were among 11 people killed by rebel fire on government-held areas of the city.

Residents of Ukambani are a happy lot, thanks to president Uhuru Kenyatta goodies, which is sure to open up the region and accelerate economic growth.
President Uhuru, launched the tarmacking of the 192 kilometre road which runs from Kibwezi through Ikutha, Mutomo, Kitui town, Kabati to Migwani for a cost Sh18.4 billion.
Also read :
Speaking after the launch at Mutomo township in Kitui County, Uhuru said upgrading of the road fulfills one of the Jubilee Government’s social economic goals for the region.
 
The President termed the road ‘a major artery’ saying its impact will be tremendous.
“Uhuru said as quoted by the Star.
The road is expected to open up the counties of Kitui, Makueni and Machakos for rapid development.
The president said, his government was a listening government and finally it was delivering on its promise to the residents.
 
The project consists of the construction and rehabilitation of the existing road to an international trunk road standard with seven metres wide single carriageway and two meters wide shoulders on each side.
The road is part of the Mombasa-Isiolo-Addis Ababa road transport corridor and will include construction of township roads in Kibwezi, Ikutha, Mutomo and Kitui towns.
 
Deputy President William Ruto, who accompanied the President, added that the Jubilee government wants the Kibwezi-Migwani road tarmacked for the benefit of the people of the region.
” he said.
 
Kitui leaders including, Senator David Musila and Kitui South MP Rachel Nyamai, thanked Uhuru for launching the construction of the road that will boost the economy of the three Ukambani counties.
Other speakers were available were Makueni governor, Kivutha Kibwana,  Machakos governor, Alfred Mutua and Kitui deputy Governor Peninah Malonza among others.

The cruel hand of death has struck The Real House of Kawangware (TRHK) actress, Truphena, robbing her of her beloved son.
Truphena whose real name is Aisha Noor, plays the role of a maid on TRHK which airs every Wednesday at 7:30 on KTN.
 
The KTN actress announced her son’s death on social media; she however didn’t mentioned what caused the sudden demise of her kid.
Truphena posted.
 
 The entire team Ghafla! wish to express our sincere condolences to Truphena and her family for the great lose, may the good Lord guide you through this trying time.

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola expressed admiration for Patrick Roberts after the loanee scored against his parent club for Celtic in a 1-1 Champions League draw.
City signed Roberts, 19, from Fulham in 2015 for a reported fee of 12 million pounds ($15.2 million, 14.2 million euros), but he played just three times before joining Celtic on an 18-month loan last February.
He came back to haunt City on Tuesday, jinking into the box from the right to score a fourth-minute solo goal, which Kelechi Iheanacho cancelled out four minutes later.
“We’re going to talk about it at the end of the season. We know his quality, but the decision is not talking about one game,” Guardiola said when asked about Roberts’s future.
“It’s for one season. We’re going to speak with him, with the managers, between each other we’re going to decide.
“But of course he has the good quality of a winger, one against one. He worked defensively. So he has potential. I’m so happy about his performance.”
Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers backed Roberts to go on and enjoy a decorated City career.
“I’m sure he’ll come back here in the summer and Pep and his staff will have a real good look at him,” Rodgers said.
“You’ve got a young English talent, a big talent, and I’m sure there’ll be a big career for him here.”
With City already assured of a last 16 berth and Celtic doomed to a fourth-place finish in Group C, there was nothing riding on the game.
City will learn their next opponents in Monday’s draw and while Guardiola drew satisfaction from home wins over Barcelona and Borussia Moenchengladbach, he also sounded a note of caution.
“The group was really, really tough,” said Guardiola, a two-time Champions League winner as Barcelona coach.
“We did one (qualifying) game before and our performance at home was really good, against Gladbach, Barcelona and today as well.
“The Champions League is not easy, especially for a team that has not experience in Europe. We cannot forget that guys.
“We have to show respect for the others, for the history, for many, many reasons. You have to win that respect through our performances through the next years.
“Now we are there and Monday we are going to see the draw and we’re going to see how is our level in February.
“It’s important how our level will be in February and hopefully it will be good to compete against the best teams in Europe.”
Celtic were trounced 7-0 by Barcelona in their first game, but Rodgers said his side’s two draws against City — with whom they shared six goals at Celtic Park in September — augured well.
“I’m absolutely delighted with the campaign overall,” said the former Liverpool manager.
“Apart from the first game, in the main our performance level has been very, very good.
“We competed against two of the superpowers in European football. We haven’t been beaten by Manchester City. We arguably could have won both games. I’m absolutely proud of the team.
“It now sets the standard for us to continue with this development and look to go on and win the league and be ready to go into the qualifiers for next season again.”

Thai authorities are investigating BBC over a Thai-language profile of the nation’s new king, officials said Thursday, after the article outraged ultra-royalists in a country where criticism of the monarchy is outlawed.
Thailand’s harsh royal defamation law has been used to jail scores of critics and spurned a culture of self-censorship across the media, academia and the arts.
Any member of the public can allege royal defamation and the police are duty bound to investigate.
BBC is now under scrutiny for a Thai-language profile it published out of its London offices of the nation’s new monarch, King Maha Vajiralongkorn, who ascended to the throne last week.
The royal succession was Thailand’s first in seven decades and is considered a delicate moment for the institution as Vajiralongkorn does not command the respect enjoyed by his revered father.
The BBC profile included information about Vajiralongkorn’s personal life that is well-known inside the kingdom but rarely printed by Thai media, such details about his three marriages that ended in divorce.
The article, which has since been blocked online in Thailand, quickly went viral on social media but attracted a torrent of criticism from royalists who accused BBC of defaming the monarch.
On Wednesday a team of police officers visited BBC’s Bangkok office but found it closed.
“This case is in the process of investigation but I cannot disclose the details,” Pornchai Chalordej, the commander of the police station responsible for the case, told AFP.
Top leaders from Thailand’s royalist junta, which has ramped up use of the lese majeste law since its 2014 power grab, defended the probe on Thursday.
“As they have an office in Thailand and Thai reporters work there they must be prosecuted when they violate Thai law,” junta chief Prayut Chan-O-Cha said of the BBC.
The junta’s number two, defence minister Prawit Wongsuwon, stressed the police’s duty to investigate any wrongdoing.
“If anything is illegal we must prosecute accordingly without exception,” he told reporters.
A prominent Thai dissident was arrested over the weekend for sharing the BBC profile on Facebook.
Jatupat “Pai” Boonpattararaksa, a leader of a small group of anti-junta students, was released on bail but faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted.
The BBC’s Thai service is one of few platforms that publishes comparatively unfiltered reporting in the Thai language.
Its articles are edited and published out of London, though the service employs a small number of local staff in Bangkok.
The BBC’s English language bureau in Bangkok is an editorially separate entity.

This was announced by the administration who are currently looking for the 54 mental patients who have not returned to the facility after escaping a few days ago.
 
The remaining doctors in the facility have revealed that the actor has been discharged however they cannot let him leave on his own as the hospital rules do not allow that.
His family on the other hand has not been visiting him since they relocated to Karen after moving out of their house in in Maringo area in Eastlands, Nairobi.
 
His wife has also not been to the hospital to see her man as reported by the healthy facility. His identity (name) and current condition has however been held due to doctor-patient confidently.

The much-touted National Super Alliance (NASA) is now a reality after Cord leader Raila Odinga said he will work Amani National Congress leader Musalia Mudavadi in the run up to the 2017 general elections.
Speaking in Laikipia, the two leaders said the by February next year.
Raila said.
Both leaders regretted their political split in 2013 as Jubilee led by President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto swept to power.
 
The declaration is a major boost for the opposition considering in October, (Cord) in a super alliance to oust Jubilee from power come next year.
Raila said in Laikipia.
Mudavadi said NASA was the best vehicle to defeat Jubilee in next year’s presidential elections and questioned the source of money being spent in Harambees by government officials especially over the weekends.
posed Mudavadi.
The two leaders also said Kalonzo Musyoka’s Wiper Party and Ford Kenya led by Moses Wetang’ula will be included in NASA to ensure the Opposition’s victory is achieved in the first round of polls.

Ghana’s President John Mahama is a man of the people who is known for his good humour, but has been forced onto the back foot by his country’s lacklustre growth.
Mahama, now 58, came to power in 2012 after narrowly defeating the New Patriotic Party (NPP) candidate Nana Akufo-Addo, who is also running in Wednesday’s presidential election.
But his government went on a spending spree, causing Ghana’s political titan and former president Jerry Rawlings to describe Mahama’s ministers as “babies with sharp teeth.”
The global commodity rout hurt Ghana — a global exporter of oil, gold and cocoa — but the ballooning debt made things much worse.
With stuttering electricity, double-digit inflation and a depreciating cedi, this West African nation was forced to turn to the International Monetary Fund for help.
Corruption scandals have plagued his government, but Mahama, an affable statesman who is popular with the public, has worked to stay above the fray with his slogan “Putting people first.”
“The saying goes that when the going gets tough, the tough get going,” a smiling Mahama said in a November interview.
In his eloquent 2012 autobiography, “My First Coup d’Etat”, Mahama describes life in Accra’s elite boarding school juxtaposed with going back to the northern village where his family is from, climbing mango trees and hunting squirrels with slingshots.
“Bole was not on the national grid, but we had a little diesel generator, which meant ours was the only house in town with lights,” Mahama writes.
Born to the son of a minister overthrown in a 1966 coup — which he describes as an “unspeakable period of violence” — Mahama later graduated from university with a history degree.
He went to Moscow in 1988 for a post-graduate degree in social psychology, where he grew “more and more disillusioned with socialism, realising that Ghana has to find its own transformative way, away from ideological dogmas.”
In 1996, he joined the NDC, where he later served as minister of communications.
Mahama became vice-president of Ghana in 2009 under President John Atta Mills.
When Mills died unexpectedly in 2012, Mahama became president and won the election that year.
“JM”, as he’s called by those close to him, is a member of the Assemblies of God, “a multi-faith family consisting of Christians and Muslims”.
Mahama says he’s a big fan of Afrobeat, music originating from Nigeria that’s an intoxicating fusion of blues, jazz and funk.

Kenyans will have to wait a bit longer, to know when the new education curriculum will be adopted.
The Ministry of Education has once again postponed the release of a new curriculum that was set to be out on Thursday in Nairobi.
Education Cabinet Secretary, Dr. Fred Matiang’i announced that the national curriculum conference to endorse the new curriculum will now be held on January 6 2017.
Also read :
Dr Matiang’i made the announcement during the national curriculum steering committee meeting held at the Kenya Institute of Curriculum development (KICD) on Tuesday.
 
The steering committee is tasked with guiding the formulation of relevant policies to facilitate the process of curriculum development, implementation and assessment of the reformed curriculum.
It is suspected that the meeting has been pushed forward in order to enable the ministry of education, brief President Uhuru Kenyatta on the new curriculum, since the process needs political backing.
This is the second time that the exercise has been pushed forward.
“ Dr Matiang’i said when he released Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examinations.
 
The Education CS, said all over the world countries were turning to the adoption of continuous assessments over summative evaluation and Kenya should follow suit.
Also read :
Matiang’I added it would however take time to fully implement the curriculum.
” he said.
 

Ghana’s New Patriotic Party (NPP) candidate Nana Akufo-Addo is hoping it’ll be third time lucky when the country votes for a new president on Wednesday.
Akufo-Addo, an erudite rights lawyer and former government minister with round tortoiseshell glasses, narrowly lost the 2008 and 2012 elections to the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC).
He contested the results in 2012 alleging electoral fraud, but ultimately accepted the Supreme Court’s ruling upholding John Mahama’s presidency.
Today Akufo-Addo, the son of a former president, has pledged to play by the rules and accept defeat even on the slimmest of margins, underscoring his commitment to keeping the peace in a country hailed as one of Africa’s most stable democracies.
“The stability and progress of Ghana and advancement of her democracy guided our actions in those difficult days,” Akufo-Addo said recently of the campaign.
Akufo-Addo is banking on the backing of voters who are frustrated with a litany of corruption scandals, unreliable electricity and sluggish economic growth.
While Mahama has been slow to address what voters perceive as worsening corruption, Akufo-Addo has promised to act quickly to stop a “borrowing binge” that has “mortgaged our future”.
The 72-year-old campaigned hard across the country, brandishing his party’s red, white and blue flag emblazoned with an elephant as a symbol for radical change.
An economic liberal, he has focussed on creating more jobs — especially among youth who face growing levels of unemployment — and on modernising the commodity-dependent economy.
His “one district, one factory” programme would encourage private sector investment, as would a policy of slashing corporate taxes.
Akufo-Addo was born in Kyebi, in the eastern region of Ghana into the political elite.
He is related to three of the “Big Six”, politicians dubbed as Ghana’s founding fathers, including his father who served as president.
Akufo-Addo, who speaks with a distinguished British accent — he studied in England — has enjoyed a successful career.
He worked in England and France before returning to Ghana.
When multi-party democracy was restored to the west African country in 1992 after decades of military rule, Akufo-Addo became involved with the NPP, later serving as both justice minister then foreign minister under President John Kufuor between 2001 and 2008.
In his last election stand-off with Mahama, he lost 47.7 to the 50.7 percent. Four years later, this will likely be his final bid for Ghana’s top job.

Earth’s days are getting longer but you’re not likely to notice any time soon — it would take about 3.3 million years to gain just one minute, according to a study published on Wednesday.
Over the past 27 centuries, the average day has lengthened at a rate of about +1.8 milliseconds (ms) per century, a British research team concluded in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A.
This was “significantly less”, they said, than the rate of 2.3 ms per century previously estimated — requiring a mere 2.6 million years to add one minute.
“It’s a very slow process,” study lead co-author Leslie Morrison, a retired astronomer with Royal Greenwich Observatory, told AFP.
“These estimates are approximate, because the geophysical forces operating on the Earth’s rotation will not necessarily be constant over such a long period of time,” he specified.
“Intervening Ice Ages etcetera will disrupt these simple extrapolations.”
The previous 2.3 ms estimate had been based on calculations of the Moon’s known Earth-braking forces, causing the ocean tides.
For the new study, Morrison and his team used gravitational theories about the movement of Earth around the Sun, and the Moon around Earth, to compute the timing of eclipses of the Moon and Sun over time, as viewed from our planet.
They then calculated from where on Earth these would have been visible, and compared this to observations of eclipses recorded by ancient Babylonians, Chinese, Greeks, Arabs and medieval Europeans.
“We obtained historical, relevant records from historians and translators of ancient texts,” explained Morrison.
“For example, the Babylonian tablets, which are written in cuneiform script, are stored at the British Museum and have been decoded by experts there and elsewhere.”
The team found discrepancies between where the eclipses should have been observable, and where on Earth they were actually seen.
“This discrepancy is a measure of how the Earth’s rotation has been varying since 720 BC” when ancient civilisations started keeping eclipse records, they wrote.
Factors which influence the Earth’s rotation include the Moon’s braking effect, Earth’s altering shape due to shrinking polar ice caps since the last Ice Age, electro-magnetic interactions between the mantle and core, and changes in the mean sea level, said the team.
The slowing of Earth’s orbit is the reason the world’s timekeepers have to adjust high-precision clocks every few years to ensure they remain in sync with our planet’s rotation.

Ghanaians began voting Wednesday in an unpredictable presidential election that is being seen as a litmus test of stability in Africa’s most secure democracy.
Once praised by US President Barack Obama for its peaceful transfers of power, Ghana has come under fire amid reports of voter intimidation and questions over the independence of the country’s election agency.
Charismatic incumbent John Mahama is running for reelection against veteran politician Nana Akufo-Addo, who has chipped away at the popularity of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) party by criticising the country’s sluggish growth and high-profile corruption scandals.
Some 15 million people are registered to vote, and polling stations opened across the country at 0700 GMT.
“We are facing a lot of problems economically, everything is messy,” Julie Amofah, a 26-year-old who cast the first ballot at a polling station in Kibi, a town 80 kilometres (50 miles) from the capital, Accra.
“I voted for change so we can move forward.”
Shadrack Opoku, an 18-year-old high school student, said Akufo-Addo of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) is the “right person for our country” who can secure future growth.
“When we complete university, we want better jobs,” Opoku said. “Right now it’s not good.”
In the final days of the campaign, Mahama flexed his significant resources to reach as many battleground regions as possible where he inaugurated blockbuster infrastructure projects, including railways and airports.
“Mahama has done well for us,” said Abudula Alhassan, a 40-year-old driver in the northern town of Bole, a government stronghold.
An exporter of gold, cocoa and oil, Ghana was once hailed as a regional growth model but has now taken on too much debt and in 2015 had to go to the International Monetary Fund for a bailout.
There are seven candidates battling for the top job and if the smaller parties perform well and deny either man a majority, a presidential run-off will be held later in December.
But ahead of the vote, tensions were building with police saying an NPP supporter was beaten to death and six others were critically wounded during clashes on Monday between supporters of the two main parties following a rally in the north.

The excited grandmother could not hide the joy of meeting her first grandson who was delivered yesterday morning at the
The baby’s name is yet to be announced, but bets are on that he could be called Raiz, the name Zari Hassan had picked and revealed on her baby shower.
Anyway, Diamond Platnumz mum flew all the way from Tanzania to South Africa to meet her grandson for the first time.
Through her gram the new grandmother referred to the baby boy as her husband, something most Swahili families do when they get baby boys.
Diamond Platnumz family is currently keeping us all in suspense as we wait to hear more on their new arrival.
Checkout Diamond Platnumz mum bonding with her ‘hubby’.
 
 
 

My personal favourites was Liz James cover of ‘Drum’, Kiss Daniel’s cover of ‘Barua’, Dela , Patoranking and Vanessa Mdee’s rendition of ‘Mafeeling’.Oh who I’m kidding? I loved the whole season of Coke Studio Africa just like a hefty kid loves their cake. It was the epitome of  the beauty of African Music and the #melaninmagic that is created once African artistes come together musically.
However, Nyashinski’s and Yemi Alade’s session seems to be everyone’s fave, because of the undeniable chemistry and the way Nyashinski looks at Yemi when she is performing ‘Mungu Pekee’. Wueh! That kind of love/like can be spotted from a mile away.
 
And judging from the You Tube comments people are feeling the Nyashinski and Yemi Alade vibe.
Here are some of the comments:
J

The official search for MH370 in the Indian Ocean has been reduced to one ship, Australian authorities said Wednesday, as relatives of the missing passengers launch their own hunt for crash debris in Madagascar.
The Fugro Equator, one of four vessels involved in the search, remains in the 120,000 square-kilometre (46,000-square-mile) zone where investigators believe the Malaysian Airlines jet went down.
The ships, three of which were contracted from Dutch firm Fugro, had been scouring the southern Indian Ocean off Western Australia state for the Boeing 777.
China’s Dong Hai Jiu 101, which was hunting for debris with a remotely operated vehicle — a device tethered to a ship by a cable — departed on Saturday, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), said.
The plane disappeared en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014 carrying 239 passengers and crew.
No trace of the jet has been found, but investigators have confirmed that three pieces of debris recovered along western Indian Ocean shorelines came from MH370.
With more than 110,000 square kilometres already examined, the Fugro Equator’s mission was expected to wrap up by February next year, the ATSB said in a statement.
The news came after families from Malaysia, China and France gathered in Madagascar’s capital Antananarivo on Monday as frustration grew over the failure to find the aircraft.
The relatives were set to distribute brochures educating villagers on how to identify plane debris.
Many next-of-kin have repeatedly complained about the lack of a coordinated search in the western Indian Ocean and along the African coast.
The ATSB said in a report last month that MH370 was likely out of control when it plunged into the ocean with its wing flaps not prepared for landing. It cast doubt on theories a pilot was still in charge.
The governments of Australia, Malaysia and China, where most of the passengers were from, agreed to pull the plug on the operation once the search area was fully scoured unless “credible new information” emerged.

ODM leader, Raila Odinga has moved to avert another loss, he painfully endured in the 2007 general elections.
The Cord leader has planned a series of meetings with elders from Tharaka Nithi County on Wednesday.
Raila will be in the Jubilee vote zone to rally support for his presidential bid in the 2017 general election.
The visit comes a day after the ODM leader was in Laikipia where he addressed a joint rally with former ODM deputy leader, Musalia Mudavadi.
The two presidential aspirants announced, that they will forge a super alliance to oust Jubilee from power when elections are called next year.
 
While Raila will be in Eastern, ODM deputy party leaders Wycliffe Oparanya (Kakamega governor) and Hassan Ali Joho (Mombasa) will grace the graduation ceremony of over 2,000 Maasai morans at Suswa in Narok County.
” Philip Etale, ODM director communications, said in a statement sent to newsrooms.
Also read : 
ODM has been traversing areas perceived to be Jubilee strongholds of late to marshal support ahead of the general election.
 
Raila visit comes on  the background of Insistent attacks by Central region leaders who of late have been blaming him for everything and anything affecting the country.
Also read :
The Tharaka Nithi charm offensive visit is bitter/sweet for the ODM leader as the region played a decisive role in denying him a chance to be the 4th president of Kenya.
Raila was leading his presidential rival, Mwai Kibaki by a huge margin in what seems like a done deal for Kibaki, until Tharaka Nithi votes were tallied putting Kibaki on the led.
Raila hopes to  convince the region to back him up this time round.

Bolivian officials arrested the head of LAMIA Airlines on Tuesday after a crash involving one of the charter firm’s planes killed a Brazilian football team and dozens of others.
Gustavo Vargas, director general of the Bolivian charter firm, was arrested as part of a probe into the November 29 crash which claimed the lives of 71 people, including all but a handful of players from Chapecoense Real football club.
“There was an arrest order for the director of the company,” said prosecutor Ivan Quintanilla, who told reporters he had issued arrest orders for six people in connection with the crash, including a secretary and a mechanic at the airline.
Aviation officials also removed documents from LAMIA’s offices as part of the probe, media reported.
LAMIA Airlines is a Bolivian-registered charter company that specializes in flying Latin American football clubs.
Chapecoense had been enjoying a fairy tale season until the crash, and at the time of the accident were en route to a championship game which they were tipped to win.
The flight crashed into the Colombian mountains not far from the city of Medellin. Of 77 people onboard, 71 were killed.
Meanwhile, officials said a senior Bolivian aviation official who authorized the flight, Celia Castedo, had fled the country and was seeking asylum in Brazil.
“Celia sought refuge in Brazil yesterday in (the town of) Corumba” in Mato Grosso state near the border of Bolivia, an government official told AFP in the capital Brasilia.
Officials said she had fled fearing for her safety and that the process of reviewing her petition to remain in Brazil could take up to a year.
But Bolivian officials branded her a fugitive.
“Her departure from the country is illegal,” Interior Minister Carlos Romero told reporters, saying La Paz would seek to have her extradited.
Chapecoense were on their way to play Atletico Nacional of Medellin in the first leg of the Copa Sudamericana final at the time of last week’s crash.
Only six people survived, three of them Chapecoense players.
Among the dead were 20 Brazilian journalists who were traveling with the team to cover the match.
Investigators from Bolivia, Brazil and Colombia are currently looking into what caused the crash, but officials have said one theory is that the plane ran out of fuel during the flight.
On December 1, Bolivia authorities revoked LAMIA’s operating license and ordered an investigation into its operations.

For most of us, pairing food and a drink seems all snobbish and bourgeois. But it’s actually not. We do it every day and we don’t even know it. We choose whether to drink water or juice or beer with food and we choose how to season our meal when preparing it; whether to add lemon or royco in our food. That in itself is pairing.
It’s not any way stylish or sophisticated to want what you eat and what you drink to taste good together. Difference between you and the person who chooses to pair red wine with beef is that you put more thought into it. You consciously decide to pair your meal and beverage.
This consequently brings us to our point of the day. If you like your food and alcohol some type of way this holiday season, there’s only one perfect place you should be at this December and that’s Brew Bistro.
 
On the 24th of December, 2016, The Big Five Breweries and Jameson Irish Whiskey will be serving a 3-course meal at Brew Bistro- Fortis (the one in Westlands). On this night, you will enjoy great Jameson and Beer pairings.
has always been known to wash down burgers and nyama choma, but it’s slowly making recognition as a fine dining food pairing partner. Whiskey is more of a smooth chilled out and the night will mostly attempt to fit that description. The night will have Jameson whiskeys, cocktails all set to liven up a dinner party.
While this is happening at Fortis, on Ngong Rd, Brew Bistro will be having a party too, a 5-course Grey Goose Vodka pairing dinner.
 
Vodka is a traditional drink, best enjoyed neat with ice cubes, the correct Russian and Poland way. Mostly we relate to it as when taking shots and a great maker mixer of cocktails but in history, vodka was actually drunk with meals.
That is the experience you will be getting at Brew Bistro Ngong Road with the Grey Goose Vodka being especially associated with distinct smoothness and character, then you expect it to make your Christmas worthwhile.
Simply a whole world full of great pairings and experiences awaits you and now it’s up to you to make that all important decision of exploring.
 

Bangladeshi child labourers who live in slums work for an average of 64 hours a week, many of them in textile factories making clothes for top world brands, a major study said Wednesday.
The new report from the London-based Overseas Development Institute has found that 15 percent of Dhaka slum-dwellers aged between six and 14 did not go to school and worked full-time.
The report, entitled “Child labour and education – a survey of slum settlements in Dhaka”, found that two-thirds of girls from slum areas who are working full-time were employed in the booming garment sector.
The findings raised concern over Bangladesh’s $30 billion clothes manufacturing industry, which is one of the world’s biggest despite a dreadful safety record.
The manager of one unnamed garment factory told researchers that while he was aware children aged 11-14 should not be working, he did not regard their employment as illegal.
He also admitted that many of his employees did not carry identification cards which would verify their age.
There was no immediate comment from Bangladesh authorities or its powerful garment manufacturers, but union leaders said child labour in factories was rampant.
The extent of child labour in Bangladesh’s textile industry was laid bare in July when a nine-year-old boy was brutally killed at one of the largest spinning factories.
Police probing the factory said they found a quarter of the workforce at the factory outside Dhaka were children.
The ODI report, one of the largest surveys on child work and education conducted in Bangladesh, found that by the age of 14 almost half of the children living in Dhaka’s slums were working.
The report’s co-author Maria Quattri said researchers found many children wanted to go to school.
“But poverty was driving parents to find jobs for their children, even though they could see that it would jeopardise their long-term future,” she wrote.
The study also found that child labour levels rise from around eight percent at the age of 10 to 45 percent at the age of 14, with 36.1 percent of boys and 34.6 percent of girls saying they had experienced extreme fatigue.

A few celebrities have announced bids to vie for various political seats in 2017 general elections. Akothee was also thought to have made similar move until she clarified the issue.
A campaign poster claiming that the songstress was vying for Migori Women Representative seat on a Jubilee ticket caused a storm.
Many people wondered by Akothee made the blunder of seeking a political seat through a party that was very unpopular in that specific region; Migori is an ODM stronghold where voters vote ‘six piece’ for the opposition party.
 
The songbird has however come out to clarify she had zero intentions for joining politics in 2017. Apparently the poster was a work of malicious person(s).
Akothee says her 2017 resolutions are to get married, give birth, finish her degree and release an album; she recently dropped a new song dubbed “Benefactor”.
Akothee posted to quash claims she was vying for a political seat.
 
 
 
 

The End of the Year is here. There’s definitely going to be a lot of festivities that include mass parties, huge consumptions of foods and drinks, wanton drunkenness and general wild merry making that won’t end till the 2nd of January 2017.
Everyone will be out here making it rain, spending cash flagrantly, buying themselves bags and bags of items and paying bills upon bills of petty things.
But not everyone will be having such a good time. Many are still riddled with poverty, financial inadequacy, debts, joblessness and despondency and therefore, they can’t afford to party up and be in the Christmas spirit like the rest of us.
One of those Kenyans who cannot afford to splash money on luxuries – or even food – like the rest of us is Susan Owuor Njuguna, a selfless Angel who has dedicated her life to not just serving herself and her two kids, but also spreading the love further and housing some other 28 homeless kids.

Susan, a single mother to two, is a modern-day Mother Teresa who now lives with some 28 other little children (boys and girls) and not only treats them as her own bit also feeds them and clothes them and takes care of them. Singlehandedly.
Life for a single mother is already a very daunting task as she’s always faced with a mountain of debts and bills as she tries to raise her own kids but Susan decided to overlook her poor state and took in some other strange children and mothered them as her own.

And because it’s Christmas, Susan had the idea of approaching eminent businessman Joe Kariuki to ask him to grant her a December job just so she could find some little cash to feed her large brood over the holidays.
But Joe told her that he had no jobs to offer.

But before she left the office, Joe called her back and asked her to report right back in his office following morning with all of the children she raises and feeds.
And the next day, Joe, a renowned business mogul and philanthropist, spent the whole day with the poor kids in his office – showing them around, letting them access the computers, letting them play around, play mobile games, sit around his expansive office and have a fun filled day.

Joe said.
Also, the children were presented with a myriad of gifts which included cookies, candy, toys, pens, books, cakes and dolls.

Now, the Candy and Candy honcho has decided to expand the philanthropy.
says Rhoda, a Bopit Kenya publicist.
The campaign, dubbed  has already been launched and millions of single women in Kenya are being asked to join in the fray, download the Bopit Kenya App and share their stories on the App Facebook page.
 
It’s a Christmas treat come early. And by the look of it, nobody is going to be eating alone this holiday.