The Politics of Student Debt and Why it Must be Abolished

Earlier this week, the High Court of Kenya issued a judgement stopping the Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) from imposing interest rates and penalties that are double the principal loan to beneficiaries. This judgement found that HELB was acting in contravention of Article 27 and sections of Article 43 of the constitution and extended the in duplum rule enshrined in Section 44A of the Banking Act to all institutional lenders and not just those borrowing from financial institutions regulated by the Central Bank of Kenya. 

Article 27 of the constitution guarantees that every person is equal before the law and has the right to equal protection and equal benefit of the law and that the state shall not discriminate directly or indirectly against any person on any ground while Article 43 guarantees a right to the highest attainable standard of education, food, healthcare, water, housing and social security.

Reflecting on the autobiography and life of Malcolm X

Malcom X was a funny man and a riveting storyteller. It’s not very surprising, he is afterall one of the greatest orators of the 20th century. But it also kind of is: his most enduring and self-endorsed legacy afterall is being “the angriest Negro in all of America”.

The entire book, and especially the first half before you get to the really gutting stuff, is entrancing. It’s a linear unfolding of the major landmarks of his upbringing as narrated to Alex Haley, peppered with brilliant comedy-coated anecdotes.

And it was a tough upbringing. 

Whose stories get told? A measured foray into news judgement

If you open Kenya’s Daily Nation on any given day, you would be forgiven to think the long going rift between President Kenyatta and his Deputy William Ruto is the most pressing issue of our day. Of the 59 headlines the Nation ran in January and February (as of the writing of this piece), well over 50% have been about this rift and even in the other 50%, the paper can’t resist having Mr Kenyatta and Mr Ruto as the headline photos. In sum, Kenya’s largest paper has named Mr Ruto on their headlines 13 times in the 59 days, none of which is in relation to his mandate as Kenya’s elected official numero deux. Mr Kenyatta’s name on the other hand has appeared 14 times, only once in vague reference to his role as head of state on 02 January 2021: Uhuru’s big new year offer. 

Why I’m writing in 2021 and why the legends do it

For the last few years my writing has been like Raila Odinga’s failing political ambitions, every time we think they are dead they refashion themselves pretending to want the least and asking for everything.  

For a brief moment in my early university career I wrote semi-consistently, mostly about my budding and frenzied feminism. At the best of times my work rehashed popular Twitter talking points about cooking and cleaning, impassioned, barely coherent, haphazard. Years after finishing my undergrad I have long wanted to practice the craft, but I lacked the impetus. There is a lot to write about, but I just didn’t know why I should, so I didn’t.

In his wonderful book Home & Exile, the literary legend Chinụalụmọgụ Achebe briefly considers this question and asserts: