Latest / Voices and Visions / Episode 7. How Media Shapes Africa's Investment Narrative with Adonijah Ndege | Voices & Visions

Transcript

Episode 7. How Media Shapes Africa's Investment Narrative with Adonijah Ndege | Voices & Visions · Voices and Visions

• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm joined by Indonesia Neg, senior reporter at TechCabal, one of the leading publications documenting Africa's technology and business ecosystems.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Indonesia has reported across various African countries, covering founders, investors, policy shifts, and the realities behind the consumer's growth narrative.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: So today I'm sitting with someone who has the most grateful job in the world.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: You could say.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: So you're a um senior reporter.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: You're a journalist.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: Why did you decide to become a reporter?
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_05: That's a hard question to really answer because I've always had a passion in writing.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_05: And uh it's not really what I thought I would be.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: What did you think you were gonna be?
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_05: I need to do uh either civil engineering or uh landscape architecture.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, that's completely different.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, uh, but uh I've always had um these storytelling skills.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_05: I write well.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I don't doubt that I've gotten a lot of compliments from people about my writing.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_05: So uh when I could not get like uh direct into entry into uh civil engineering, I just decided, okay, let me follow my uh writing passion.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_05: And also um I care about people so much, care about good systems, care about things that work properly.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_05: So sort of journalism is about uh caring about things, telling people what is going wrong.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_05: There's that surveillance role of a journalist.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_05: Like uh you scrutinize staff, who is stealing from who, what is going on well, what is not working as supposed to be, and give people solutions to some of these things.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_05: So that is how I ended up in journalism.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: So, but you didn't start at Tech Cabal, right?
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: You started somewhere else first.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_05: I started uh actually my very first uh job, I interned at uh publication Kenyan Weekly.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_05: Kenyan Weekly was uh a publication owned and run by the biggest opposition party, or DM.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: When was this?
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_05: Uh this must have been in uh 2015.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_05: Then from Kenyan Weekly, worked at uh intern, then worked at um a nation for about 10 years.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: So nation media is the largest one here, right?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, it's uh it's the largest independent news outlet in eastern and central Africa.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_05: So worked there at Business Daily as an intern, then as uh an editor, an online editor.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, before I decided to why did you decide to become a reporter in the business area?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know what really happened, but I've always had like even my very first internship was in something sort of political related.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I don't know how I ended up in business reporting.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_05: But eventually, I think when I joined Nation, they posted me to Business Daily.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_05: And that is how now I just found myself okay in the business space.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_05: And I remember I had to learn a lot of things because in journalism school, you are just taught uh how to write, how to evaluate information, how to evaluate information.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_05: But when you move into a specialized or a niche area like business, you really need to understand a lot of stuff, how say the capital market works, how companies are run.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, you need to have some basic understanding of the balance sheet.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_05: And those are things that if you don't have a strong business background, then you likely have to learn, uh, learn them on the job.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_05: So I think after I joined Business Daily, now had to learn.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_05: And every day was a learning uh, I don't know, process or something, experience.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: So how you say you have an interest in politics as well, right?
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like almost every conversation that we've had, so I think the listeners and the viewers don't know this, but we've had some interesting dinners, and every time we have a conversation and we start talking about business, we always end up talking about politics.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: So do you for you, these two are completely in intertwined, yes, right?
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: You can't evaluate the one without the other in this context as well.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_05: Politic runs everything.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_05: Uh if we don't fix our politics, there's no way we can fix our business.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_05: And fixing our politics in this sense is having the right leaders, uh having like following the rule of law.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_05: The difference between uh a system that functions well and uh uh a system that maybe is flawed or something is that a perfect system rewards merit.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_05: And a perfect system punishes the wrongdoers.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_05: But when you have when your politics is flawed, like corruption is a uh a product of uh bad system, that's regulation.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_05: Bad leadership, yeah.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_05: Uh a slow justice system is a result of corruption.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_05: So if say you you have a business deal or a deal gone wrong, then you go to court, you need to bribe the lawyers, you need to bribe a poor regulation environment, is a result of bad politics.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_05: Because if the leadership is right, they need to fix uh every policy that is there.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, we need to have the right regulation, you need to know how you can license businesses, and that can only happen if the politics is functioning well.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_05: So that is why if you start a conversation on business or whatever it is, any anything, uh any sector that say has a direct impact on people, you'll likely end up in politics because politics sort of in the last couple of years has been a main blocker to some real progress.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, at the same time, I mean, also as a reporter on business, I mean, sometimes you've explained you're also more of an investigative reporter in that sense.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: You do uncover things that go wrong, right?
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And you do uncover um corruption or bad just bad stories, right?
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: But the question is always how can you blame them when they're operating in a rigged system or a frauded system?
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Blame other the companies, you know, because um there's this one of the other speakers on the podcast said, you know, corruption is like a bump in the road and it's gonna make you slow down.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the question is how are you going over it, right?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Are you are you gonna pay the bribe?
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: Are you gonna participate in it?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: Or are you gonna hold off, which means that it may take you a long a lot longer to get over that bump in the road, right?
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because it slows every process down.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and if you look in the context of business, speed is often something that you know is valued, is necessary.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it it's a fine line, right?
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: So you have to report on, you know, also companies not doing the right thing, at the same time knowing very well that the system doesn't reward merit.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_05: Okay, I'm a firm believer of always do what is right.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_05: And if you do what is right consistently, you'll be rewarded.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:18
  unknown: Yeah.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: So you believe in karma?
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_05: Not really in karma, but as a human being, you should always strive to do what is what is right.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_05: As a journalist, I have a responsibility to tell people what is happening.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_05: Whether they like it or not.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_05: And do this consistently.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_05: So if a company is engaged in say corruption, uh the issue here is not whether I blame them or not, but they've engaged in corruption.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_05: Is corruption a good thing?
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_05: No.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_05: That's it's a bad thing.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_04: And uh everyone has a choice to do what is right or to do what's wrong.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_05: And there's this tendency where uh corporations engage in uh in say corruption, knowing very well that they'll benefit uh out of it.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, and the only pla uh the only way a corporation will benefit from corruption is grow their profits or yeah, more money.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_05: It means more money to the shareholders, yeah.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, and they don't really do much in uh bringing about change.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_05: If corporations have a lot of power, yeah.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_05: Think of any big company in Kenya, Banco, telco, whichever company, if they want a regulation to be changed or a policy to be changed, they can lobby, they can push for it.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_05: But they choose not because they are also that they also benefit from that flawed system.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_05: And who loses in all this?
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_05: The ordinary person.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_05: So it's not about who to blame, it's more about uh doing what is right.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, uh if corruption is bad, stop engaging in it.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_05: If you've um I've I've actually spent about uh seven hours in a police cell because I refuse to give a bribe.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_05: I don't bribe.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_05: And I live in a system that rewards bribes.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_05: Rewards bribes.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_05: You need a placement to a good school, you definitely have to bribe someone.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_05: You're uh arrested by police for a minor traffic offense, they'll read for you, I don't know, some Trump charges or what.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_05: You'll end up paying a bribe.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_05: And now I think when I talk to people, they tell me that it's now extending it even into uh the private sector.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_05: Uh there's one top bank last year, I think, sent home um a number of their staff because of the staff would ask for bribes to approve loans.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_05: So we are seeing that we've seen uh say some utilities when you want to say be connected to power.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_05: This is a profit-making company, this company that should be serving uh uh the customers, but as a customer you have to bribe someone before you get good service.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: So corruption, these uh there's no uh the only personal blame in all this thing is uh the people who are do uh not doing much to change everything that is and what do you think the role of uh media is in uh making sure that this can potentially change?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_05: Media has a huge role, uh surveillance.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_05: We need to scrutinize everything that's that is in the public, but we need to hold uh everyone to account.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_05: And that is telling the story as it is.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: Transparency.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_05: Transparency.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah, with without any bias.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_05: And I know sometimes there are a lot of there are a lot of dynamics in the way the media is run.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_05: Uh it's quite unfortunate that media are currently undergoing a lot of transformation.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_05: Uh the business models are changing, and that means that the old models that are there are not as uh rewarding or profitable.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_05: So media, media, a lot of media outlets in the region are under very tight budgets, they're constrained uh financially and everything.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_05: And that affects the storytelling.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_05: But we need to think of it in the long term.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_05: How how do we keep up with uh storytelling, uh holding people to account?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_05: I know some of these people actually have but the people who have this power, they also own the media outlets and they just want the media uh media houses to just rejig whatever propaganda that they want to churn out.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, but as a journalist, uh as journalists, we have a responsibility to tell the story at uh as it is.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: So how does the um how does the because you you've traveled a lot.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: You've been to, was it 48 of the 54 African countries?
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, maybe before we dive, how is that?
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: When did you do that and how how on earth did you do that?
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: Where did you find the time?
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm looking for some.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_05: Okay, part of it has been uh through my work as a journalist.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I think half of that has been uh maybe I've gone to a conference, yeah.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_05: Uh there's an event somewhere, I've been invited.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_05: Uh half of it has been um uh just travel, yeah.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_05: Uh to experience, yeah, um, see around.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_05: Uh the half that I've done by myself, mostly in southern Africa, I've done a lot of uh road trips, uh Tanzania, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Stop making me jealous, we get it.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_05: So it's I think if as an African, you need to have an understanding of where you are or where you come from, and that responsibility is greater when you are uh when I you are a journalist, because we see a lot of imported narratives where they don't really paint the full picture.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_05: And travel like breaks all that, gives you a different perspective.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_05: It makes you, I don't know.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_05: Uh personally, travel has made me more human because it has made me understand the suffering of each and every person on the continent.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_05: I've seen successes in real time, I've seen those wild narratives, important narratives, like dismantled in real time.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_05: Say in Kinshasa, what is the first thing that will they likely tell you?
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: Must be dangerous.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_05: If you tell someone that you are, say, in Namibia, what will they likely tell you?
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Must be nice.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, but shock on you.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_05: If you are in Kinshasa, Kinshasa is just like Nairobi.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_05: Safer, uh, though the population is bigger.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_05: So travel again makes you understand some of these things.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, when I was in DRC, for instance, it was doing Ebola, there was uh uh a volcanic eruption, of course, the Eastern DRC uh squabbles or whatever it is.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_05: And people would think, okay, actually, my friends and my family would check on me every day, yeah.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_05: Think whether I'm okay.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_05: And I was having the best you're like, I can't pick up right now.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm having fun.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, despite the language barrier, yeah, because the their French speaking or lingala, their Swahili is not uh it's a bit different from Kenyan Swahili.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_05: So there's uh some difficulty in understanding each other.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_05: Though Eastern DRC now is close, uh their Swahili is closer to the Nairobi Swahili.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_05: So travel helps you change your perspective.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_05: You'll see a lot of things that are not very obvious.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_05: Uh you'll see what really matters.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_05: If, say, you go to a country like Sudan or Southern Sudan, you'll get to understand who holds the power.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, you'll get to understand the hassle culture there.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_05: Uh much of our uh economies are informal.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_05: So you'll find that you'll understand the informality in how we do things, uh, which informal sector drives like uh economic growth or whatever it is.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_05: Uh there's high unemployment rate, a youth unemployment rate in most African countries.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_05: But again, if you look at what say will be painted in data or the media narratives that are out there, you might fail okay.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_05: The first thing that will hit you is okay, these people are so many people are unemployed, they they're suffering or whatever it is.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_05: But now when you travel, you get to understand that despite all this, there are certain informal sectors that they're just not reported on.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_05: Like agriculture is largely subsistence in Kenya.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_05: I know so many people who rely on it to take their children to school, uh, buy whatever they need in the house, you get.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_05: So travel helps you paint a clearer picture that no one else or no other uh say uh information source can give you.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: And which um kind of key narratives within the travel, like within traveling around, have you seen?
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you, when you left Kenya and you went to this other country, that maybe you in your head even thought, oh, this is gonna be like this.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: And it turned out to be to be completely different.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_05: There's there's always this, okay.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_05: Uh there's always this feeling that as Africans, we are one.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_05: I I know there are a lot of people who make this joke that Africa is not one country.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_05: Then there are people who say, ah, indeed, Africa is a is a country.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_05: So we share a lot of similarities.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_05: And I see this even in the uh tech startup uh ecosystem, they sort of think that Africa is one market.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that expansion is going to be easy.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, scalable.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_05: Expansion will be very easy.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_05: Just for context, we have the English-speaking Africa.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_05: We have a small uh section of Africa that speaks Spanish.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_05: We have this French-speaking Africans and Portuguese-speaking Africans.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_05: And I remember when last year there's a story that I wrote on Cape Vad.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_05: I spoke to the uh minister in charge of digital economy, and he told me we are doing a lot of remarkable things here.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_05: They had just opened uh I think an innovation hub funded by the was it uh European investment bank or or World Bank, I'm not very sure.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_05: And you say that most of our successes are not captured even in African media.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_05: So then there's this narrative that okay, generally uh a lot of African countries are corrupt.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_05: A country like Evad scores even lower than uh most European countries in corruption index.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_05: So these are some of the narratives that they don't come out.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_05: They don't come out.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, right.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_05: Also, uh people think that founders or let me just let me not choose founders because there are a lot of people who run enterprises or businesses.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: Business owners maybe a better word, or yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, let's use the uh business owners that whatever problems they're solving are simple.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_05: No, I did you not I no, I don't actually I don't I don't think that whatever be it a small shop owner in Western Kenya or where any business owner who has impact on a mission, they're always filling some infrastructure gap.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_05: And these are these are narratives that are not captured in how how we report about Africa, how we write about Africa, the narratives that are out there.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then within Africa, how is the how is the media ecosystem developing?
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: So techal comes from Nigeria.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's two or three of you now in Kenya, right?
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: So are there certain markets as well that are better marketed, you know, better represented by local media?
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, better uh you mean like tech ecosystems?
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: In general, also the media ecosystem.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of it is moving digitally, right?
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: So um almost all media channels have a digital channel now, which is of course completely um very important.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: But also, even you know, if your media company, uh whether it's digital or not, has this its main base in Layout, yeah.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_00: Then of course the news from there will be more accurate representative.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: There will also be more stories coming out, right?
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: Because you're relying on the resources of your reporters.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um now you guys are in Kenya as well.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like, are you are you able to capture this Africa as a whole, or do you think that's like a huge that that's kind of an infrastructure issue that also needs to be we are trying?
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's a great answer.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, um, what do you need?
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, the this is another wild, um, I don't know, uh uh like a narrative that is out there that Africa is small, yeah.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_05: Sort of you can just cover it as the in the fastest way possible or like the sports section in a newspaper second.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: Here's everything on Africa.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, Africa is huge, it's massive, it's massive, yeah.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_05: And as not just not even just take a ball, but there are certain markets that dominate the narrative.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, and maybe it's because they get a lot of investor interest, and so you'll find that most uh media outlets, and sort of this also follows uh uh countries that traditionally have had a strong media environment, yeah.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, like Kenya.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, we have a lot of established media brands in Kenya, South Africa, and Central Egypt, yeah, and Nigeria.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_05: And so that means that uh they have the talent, uh, they have the right environment for media investments.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: Developing the media.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, developing the media and everything.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_05: So you'll find that they'll do uh they'll dominate the stories on the continent.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, and now that means that there are certain countries that are doing good things, but they'll not be captured because one, their uh their local media is not as strong or as vibrant as it should be.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: Not enough funding and not enough funding.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_05: Uh a lot of uh people moving away from investing in media.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_05: Uh though some of these things are captured on uh social media, but again, uh on the continent, there are certain countries that dominate social media conversations.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_05: Like uh let me just use the word the those who are loud, louder than the others.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_05: You likely uh see a lot of things coming from Nigeria, one because of the large population, and a lot of them are on on online.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_05: You'll see a lot of conversations in Kenya and South Africa, and so and from an investment point of view, it's very hard to cover the whole of Africa.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, you can only have boots on ground in so many places with yeah, yeah.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_05: But the long-term view of it is we'd love to cover the whole.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, any media outlet would love to see all the expand as big, as uh as cover a huge geographical area as possible.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, but you see, so you see the business model of media change.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and um I think media is about access, and then access comes with events.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but the value of an event is just quite low, I think, currently.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: What do you what do you think they should look like then?
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_05: How events should should look like.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, to bring most benefits to founders and investors.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_05: One, they should be very accessible.
• 29:19
  unknown: Yeah.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_05: That is in terms of ticketing.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_05: Um tickets should reflect the realities on the ground.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so that not everyone has fundraised three, four million and attend.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, if if you want to charge a thousand dollars, how many founders can afford that?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've even seen side events that were only an hour or two where you had to pay a hundred dollars, but you weren't even able to see who might potentially be there.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't even a well-known organization.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: I thought this is outrageous.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: To you don't even know what you're getting.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_05: And another thing, okay, uh especially for sort of global events, global uh business or investment or tech events in Nairobi.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_05: I feel like they're so out of touch with the realities.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_05: Um, and these from right from who attends.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I'm sorry to say this, they're so white.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: No, you can say it.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: I'm right here.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: I've been to one.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, they're uh they're so white, you'll likely not meet uh a substantial number of local uh save and investors.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_05: I think the last events events in the last uh say four months in Nairobi didn't meet any local bank or any local fund.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_05: Most of the Western funds or Western funds with offices in Nairobi.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_05: Understandably, uh, because uh a lot of uh capital sale flows from the West.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_05: But we need to see a local uh a lot of participation from locals, right?
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_00: From founders who actually access that capital.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_05: And I think from a founder point of view, because I've been speaking to a lot of founders, they say the ticket prices are high, that they struggle to meet the right people, you get.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_05: Uh there's uh someone I spoke to yesterday, I was interviewing him for a story.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_05: And I asked him about an event in South Africa.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_05: Uh asked him whether he'll be going there this year.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_05: He told me no, because he didn't really feel like he got the value.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_05: He's been trying to fundraise for some years now.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know whether he's succeeded or not.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, then even the narratives or the stories or the discussions, they need to reflect the realities.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_05: They should be topics that resonate with a lot of people.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: And the stories are quite inflated as well, right?
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_05: And like there was this uh there was this conference uh two weeks ago.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_05: Without really understanding the fundamental flaws or the fundamental problems that have maybe hindered this African rising narrative for the past uh couple of years.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me more about African rising narrative.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_05: There's always been this narrative that kind of frontier market idea.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, okay.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: That one.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, that the next big growth will come from Africa.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, say the next big company will likely come from Africa.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_05: Which is true.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, we have the market, uh, though the purchasing power of our market is lower compared to other regions of the world.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_05: So it's it's it's uh I don't know.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_05: But this African rising narrative, it's been pushed, but people really scrutinize or interrogate it further.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_05: Probe like, why is it not happening?
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_05: Or which parts of Africa are rising, uh, which parts are still lagging behind.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_05: Uh why are they lagging behind?
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_05: And I think this is because we rely so much on data.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_05: And they say that data is linear, like doesn't really show you what is underneath you get.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_05: And so we need like some sort of vaccination against this generalization.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_05: That okay, everything will happen, uh, despite all the problems, will rise.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_05: And you'll get that a lot.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_05: I know it's it's good to be optimistic that okay, we're gonna grow uh the startups or whatever companies or the entrepreneurs will create more jobs, but are we laying the foundation for sustainable growth?
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_05: It depends.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_05: There are those, there are some countries that are doing it.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, there are others that are still struggling to do it.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_05: And so most conferences do not capture these.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:13
  unknown: Yeah.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: I think an issue I have with that narrative as well, and it it's a narrative that also lives in Europe and in the US, right?
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: And um, that um the most attention will go to the one that raises the most money.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Those tend to go tits up pretty fast, those companies, you know, and there is a lot of issues with raising aggressively and uh being overvaluated.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_05: Um do you know why?
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_05: Capital f follows narrative.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: No way, that's actually what this podcast is about.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's weird.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_05: So uh I don't know, uh may maybe this uh the wrong view, or but this sort of a personal opinion.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_04: Uh capital uh capital follows emotions at the start before it becomes rational.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_04: And building emotions you need a clear narrative.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_04: You need to tell stories uh stories, I mean.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_05: And if you look at the companies that get the most attention, uh let's not talk about legacy companies.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_05: Let's just focus now focus on the new up and coming.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_05: The new up and coming companies.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_05: The ones that have raised the most, they're constantly in the media.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_05: Um, I think they retain some of the best uh public communications or PR uh companies.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_05: Uh they have good relations with editors across the continent or media owners.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_05: And so they get the visibility.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_05: Whether the question the question of whether their their business models are good or they are solving a problem that is there, that is neither here nor there.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_05: But it's they've mastered what can capture the attention of.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, whether that is through PR or owned media or partnerships.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_05: And that is where now even journalists are failing, because we need to interrogate and scrutinize some of these things.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_05: You can't just give a platform to you can't just give a platform to anyone.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_05: That okay, you've fundraised 1.5 million.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_05: Uh fundraise should no longer be news.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_04: Because a good idea should attract investment.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_05: Uh you sell an idea or you pitch to get an investor's attention.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_05: For you to get the money.
• 38:23
  unknown: Yeah.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then you're gonna make the change.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: So that's where the story should go.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_05: So exactly.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_05: So the story should be the impact.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: Not the fund, not the money.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_05: Not the money that you fundraised.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_05: And I think that is still lacking uh across the continent.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, we are not seeing as much impact stories like these companies, uh, because I may be wrong or right on this, uh, but again, this is just uh from where I see it, it's my personal opinion.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_05: I feel the amount of money that Kenyan startups have raised in the past decade, we should be seeing like even an uptick in job creation.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_05: Job creation.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_05: I know people will say, okay, uh there are those stories out there that 98% of startups fail.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_05: I I don't know, I don't know the percentage, but I feel like no one starts a business just because it's it's gonna fail.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_05: And uh the reason why people get into a business is one to maybe solve a problem that is there.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_05: And if you solve a problem that is there, the problem can be okay, uh, maybe there's an access issue if it's payment, maybe you'll bring down the cost or you make payments easy for people.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_05: Then now there's the other uh part of it, like create jobs, yeah, uh some social responsibility that companies have.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_05: So the amount of money that has been raised over the past say decades, 10 years, a decade, I don't feel like it's actually made a difference.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, and I I know there are a lot of people who might not agree.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_00: I think it also kind of differs per sector, right?
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you look at you know, the money that has flown into you know energy access, off-grid solar, you know, those have had impact in connecting people to the grid to say, or creating access.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so you know, but those now the investment that used to go in there are now being shifted towards, you know, other sectors that might now need it more.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the question is always how sustainable are the investments that have been made.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think it also depends on whether you're doing the investment for the bottom of the pyramid or whether you're um doing it for other types of secondary needs.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_05: I think most actually most startups they tag at the bottom of the pyramid.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but we've had a conversation about this before.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_00: Where if we do an investment at the bottom of the pyramid, if you want to give someone who doesn't have money access to something, the main solution here is a credit.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_00: So you're actually just misplacing the so first the problem was you didn't have the product.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_00: Now the problem is you don't have money.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because you've had to so there's no the in-between zone is never addressed.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_05: And I think the run comes from trying to solve a problem that is not there.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_04: And um a good example of that I give is biofuels.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_05: Um, most uh startups, they like this uh how do we call them?
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_05: This energy saving or whatever cooking solutions.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, you're talking about these modern cook stores.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh company that went uh yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_05: So uh their solution is we want to pull people out of using dirty fuels like kerosene and uh charcoal.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_05: And a lot of people who use kerosene and charcoal are low-income uh households.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_05: And it's because charcoal and kerosene are cheaper, not really cheap, but you can get them in portions, small portions, like 100 shillings per day.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_05: And so most of these biofuel uh startups, they sort of copy that model.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you'd be like biofuel as a service, kind of where you choose.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_05: So you with a hundred shillings you can be able to cook.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_05: But they're not they're not really addressing the problem that no one chooses to be poor.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_05: And anyone who buys charcoal or kerosene, it's because they cannot afford LPG gas, which is more expensive, then that means that uh as long as they can buy this uh these small portions, whether it's kerosene or biofuel, they'll continue using it.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_00: But you're not really solving the problem.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_05: Consistent access, yes, yeah.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_05: They don't have enough uh income.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, what yeah, to get this.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so what are you asking?
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_05: Eventually, eventually your your your your your business will collapse.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_05: And uh most most of them now think, okay, let's sell carbon credits to subsidize uh consumption.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_05: I think a private company, I don't know, but a private company should not be subsidizing consumption.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_05: That's the work of the government, yeah.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_05: It's the government that should subsidize consumption.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_05: But if you now build your entire business model on subsidizing consumption, yeah, and you're not solving the underlying uh uh problem that is low income or unemployment, then I don't know the market you're serving.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think one of the things that could be interesting to bring into it is we say, you know, there's always been a third sector, right?
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_00: So public, private, and then NGO and philanthropy.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_00: And over the past years, and especially um since you know COVID, but also you know, this trade versus aid discussion has um well gone to a next level, right?
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_00: So aid has been cut.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there is less money available for aid, but certain problems still exist.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_00: And now the problems that aid or NGOs were fixing or were providing space for, whether that is access to energy, um, to uh healthcare, to education, nobody is doing that anymore, right?
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so this gap is getting bigger.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_00: You have the private sector trying to solve a problem, but they can't do that because you can't make a profit on these people.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and the public sector is lagging behind.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_00: So what do we do?
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_00: Do we bring that?
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_00: Do we need to bring back the NGOs?
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_05: No.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_00: What do we do?
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_05: And and again, if you look at the whole NGO model, it's sort of the same as uh whatever I'm trying to say here.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_05: If you don't address the underlying problems, yeah, it's the whole thing will fault at some point.
• 46:19
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I mean because you know, we say it's individual unsustainable.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_05: Even aid, yeah, exactly.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_05: Aid is not sustainable.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because it just burns.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, you just burn money from wherever you you get it.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_05: So you say the government is government in the end.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, it's it's the government.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, that's the role of the government.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, it's the government that should fix some of these things.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_05: Access to energy, the government has it's like a bottomless pit of taxpayers' money that they can put into uh into some of these uh amenities or whatever it is, yeah, the infrastructure that is needed.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_05: So, and this is not to discredit the work that say uh these companies are doing.
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_05: These companies are doing, yeah.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_05: They are solving a problem that sort of access to energy, say even uh those people who live off-grid, yeah, access to solar and everything, the work is good, but we need to like push the government to do this so that the private sector can now sort problems that are sort of uh sustainable, like that we lay the sustainable foundation I was telling you about.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so that as soon as we create jobs and everything.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_00: As kind of an ending when we talk about narrative, I ask people to tell me about what they think Kenya is and what Kenya isn't.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'd like to know your answer.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_05: Uh that's sort of a tough one.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_05: Uh, I might have my biases.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_00: Go ahead.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um put them on the top.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_05: But one, Kenya is a very beautiful country.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_05: A lot of opportunities.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_05: But again, I tell people that Kenya is a and uh sort of this extends to other African countries.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_05: Kenya is uh a land of so many contradictions, yeah, and these contradictions play out in our day-to-day, day-to-day life.
• 48:34
  SPEAKER_05: Uh you can be sitting here having some good meal, uh, and maybe uh a mile away from here, someone is maybe suffering or whatever it is.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_05: And but amid all this, there's always this positive energy.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, there's a lot of resilience.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_05: I think yesterday I saw uh I don't know, no, it was not yesterday.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I spoke to a founder last week, and I asked him to tell me something about himself, and he told me that he's the most resilient person he's ever met.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_05: And I can tell you, like, every Kenyan I've met has this good and bad story of coming from nothing or overcoming a challenge, yeah.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_05: And so there's that resilience, there's the beauty about the country, and so many uh contradictions.
• 49:49
  unknown: Yeah.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_00: And what is Kenya not?
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_04: What Kenya is not uh that that's that's that's a tough one.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_05: Well what what Kenya is not?
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_05: Let me think, let me think.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_05: Kenya is not poor.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, uh how there people say Africa is poor, and that means that you lamp all African countries.
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and also poverty is a very uh broad term.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, Kenya is very rich.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I have my criticism of the government and everything else, but I would say we have some semblance of working systems.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_05: Like uh you'll go to a village, find some running taps, or a health center, even if the drugs are not, even if the drugs are not there.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_05: So and this is because the country is not poor.
• 51:11
  SPEAKER_05: We can actually we can actually afford to give every Kenyan the life and the dignity they deserve.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, so that is what Kenya is not.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_05: Kenya is very rich.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_05: And if we can get everything right, then we'll have a very yeah, you know I've said that Kenya is beautiful.
• 51:35
  SPEAKER_05: It will be more beautiful.