Can YOU outsmart the expert?

By Star reporter

Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta has said the gov-ernment is committed to the global efforts to combat money laundering and ter-rorism financing.

Speaking in Maseru, Lesotho’s capital, dur-ing the 10th anniversary of eastern and Southern africa Money Launder-

ing Group (eSaaMGL), Uhuru said although Kenya currently does not have a comprehensive anti-money laundering law, the govern-ment has republished the Proceeds of crime and Money Laundering Bill.

He is optimistic that the Bill will be passed before the end of the year and will provide ways to tackle the money laundering problem.

eSaaMGL comprises 14 member countries and is geared to join more than 150 other countries which have ratified strategies to fight money laundering and terrorism financing ncom-bating measures. The minister said even as the Bill awaits Parliaments approval, several measures to safeguard various sectors of the economy have been

undertaken. These include the narcot-

ic drugs and substance act 1994, the anti-ccorruption and economic crimes act 2003, the Public Procure-ment and Disposal act 2005. Uhuru, who is the outgoing president of the eSaaM-GL, handed over to the Lesotho Finance minister Timothy Thahane.

By JaMeS MBUGUa

TriBe has again emerged as a flashpoint in this year’s population census with many arguing it may be used to reopen ethnic dis-sections in a nation healing from political violence.

Prof Peter Wanyande of the University of nairobi says most politicians will be keenly looking at the popu-lation of their respective ethnic communities.

But for the business class, ethnic mathematics ranks low. Far more interesting for them will be the number of young people living in the country and the level of household incomes.

Business leaders who spoke to The Star at the weekend cited the size of the youth population as the first thing they would be looking for from the 2009 census data.

“i believe we need to sup-port and rally support for this process as it’s an inter-nationally accepted way of generating national statis-tics. We should not politi-cise or seek to tribalise such an important process which will help all players to im-prove on their planning re-sponsibilities,” said naku-

matt’s operations director Thiagarajan ramamurthy.

“as a progressive busi-ness entity, we are heavy consumers of all forms of data compiled through sci-entific methods. The whole range of data at our dis-posal helps us to fine tune our service delivery plans,” ramamurthy said.

nestle, the food and nu-trition multinational, will be keenly awaiting the cen-sus data. nestle’s equatorial

region corporate commu-nications manager Brinda chiniah said census num-bers will help the company craft and market its prod-ucts apart from helping in designing corporate social responsibility programmes.

“To engage in sound decision-making processes, we need to know who our shoppers/consumers are in terms of social class, pur-chasing power, geographi-cal distribution, unemploy-

ment rates, movement from rural to urban regions, age categories and gender,” chiniah said.

Samsung electronics, will be interested in the youth population in the country and their income levels.

“Those are the future for our business,” said Kenya’s head of marketing amit Patel. George Laboso, who manages sales of mortgages at Kenya commercial Bank, said they will be interested in seeing the penetration of home ownership as well as purchasing power of Ken-yans.

at Kenya Data networks, population distribution will be a major category to watch particularly because the company spends heavily on laying fiber optic cable to populated areas.

“Basically you would look at the number of peo-ple in different parts of the country because one of the things we are doing is roll-ing out digital villages,” said KDn’s marketing manager Vincent Wang’ombe.

Wang’ombe said KDn would also look at the spending capacity of people in different areas as it looks to connect all the schools in the country.

ALY KHAN’S

the danGer in lancinG the Boilof defaUltS in niGerian BankS

We landed at Heathrow Airport in Britain in the early hours of Saturday morning. As we collected our luggage, with the sleep still in all our eyes, a huge advert caught my eye. It was an advert for Intercontinental Bank of Nigeria. It was supersized and Orwellian.

I met a well known fund manager 12 months ago and he had told me that he had sold all his Nigerian bank shares the day he had seen this advert. Seeing the advertisement reminded me of his words and actions which now appear very prescient.

The Nigeria Stock exchange is around 22,000 having got near enough 60,000 and last week the new Nigeria central bank governor fired five Bank CeOs and announced a $2.6 billion (Sh198bn) bailout.

These five banks controlled 40 per cent of the credit in the Nigerian economy. The action in Nigeria is equivalent to our

Central Bank firing Adan Mohammed of Barclays, Martin Oduor-Otieno of KCB, James Mwangi of equity Bank, Richard etemesi of Stanchart and Gideon Muriuki of the Cooperative Bank. Self evidently, not a small thing.

The Naira is a whisker below 160.00 versus the dollar and at record lows. The central bank released a list of debtors that included the chairman of the Nigeria Stock exchange, Alhaji Dangote. The CeO of Intercontinental Bank (the advert which I referred to in the beginning) has apparently absconded to London.

Now the point is if this is a decisive lancing of the boil, then this might well be a cathartic and a final flushing out. International banks will step in, pick up the pieces and this will prove a real low ball entry point. If pus keeps seeping out of the boil in a drip drip fashion, then things will go a lot lower.

Take your pick.

Shares go up and down and readers are advised that this column representsMr Satchu’s personal opinions.

Kenya to back fight on money laundering

STARPORTFOLIO

CRuCIAL: a clerk shows a form that will be used in the census.

THE STAR Monday, August 24, 2009 LOCAL 17

Businessmen eyethe census results

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