The ongoing protests in Kenya has necessitated organisers of the Namibia-Kenya Chamber of Commerce to change the initial venue for its launch on 31 October from Nairobi to Windhoek “to give room for imminent positive political and economic changes currently sweeping the country,” said Elvis Mboya, the chamber’s founder and brand ambassador.
The Kenyan protests, whose initial goal was to campaign against president William Ruto’s punitive finance bill, not only led to the collapse of the bill, but also prompted the Kenya head of state to fire his entire cabinet, save for prime cabinet secretary.
However, the protests have now snowballed into a call to revamp the entire political system, with ongoing weekly protests.
The chamber’s founder had earlier joined other Kenyan leaders and the business community to reject the same punitive bill through an opinion piece published in local media at the beginning of June, which he said “contains punitive taxes poised to dent the progressive strides made towards bolstering much-needed intra-Africa trade. More specifically, it threatens the efforts to enhance and strengthen trade and investments between Kenya and Namibia”.
Mboya’s rejection of the bill was backed by auditing firm KPMG Kenya’s data that showed the bill was expected to impact both Namibian and Kenyan importers and exporters, manufacturers, air travellers, banking and money transfer chains, as well as digital marketplaces.
Said Mboya: “The chamber respects and supports positive political agitations geared towards unlocking regressive systems in order to create an enabling environment for doing business locally – and by extension, attract cross-border trade and investments to unlock and accelerate growth and opportunities distributed equitably”.
The Namibia-Kenya Chamber of Commerce was initially scheduled to be launched in October this year as a platform for investors and traders interested in exploring new opportunities in the two countries.
These two countries serve as gateways to vast markets, namely the East African Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
The chamber builds on the success of the Namibia-Kenya Marketplace Global, a digital platform launched in 2020 which already connects more than 1 500 businesses and professionals, and successfully hosted Namibia-Kenya Trade and Investment conferences in Nairobi and Windhoek.