“To take part in the African revolution it is not enough to write a revolutionary song; you must fashion the revolution with the people” Ahmed Sekou Toure There continues to be a great deal of dialogue and debate on what the data revolution from the report of the High Level Panel on the Post-2015 Development…
Read articleAt the foundation of strengthening good governance and better service delivery in Kenya lies the ability of the government and civil society organisations to engage with citizens. A major obstacle to the strengthening of this ability is capacity and awareness of citizen engagement best practices and optimal usage of technological tools that strengthen citizen engagement…
Read articleOn 29th May 2014, we conducted a Data Visualization training at The Institute for Social Accountability (TISA), a civil society initiative committed towards the achievement of sound policy and good governance in local development in Kenya, to uplift livelihoods of, especially, the poor and marginalized. TISA collects, organizes and publishes tons of data with a view…
Read articleBuntwani aims to be a conversation starter and facilitator among various stakeholders actively involved and/or interested in the potential of ICT in strengthening citizen engagement and participation in Africa, as well as showcase the innovations that work and aim to decipher the strategies that make them work. The 2014 edition in Kenya will be the…
Read articleThis past week I had the privilege of attending and participating in the International Conference for e-Democracy and Open Government (CeDEM14), at the Danube University Krems in Austria. This year’s conference brought together 133 participants from 33 countries to discuss issues related to e-democracy, e-participation and open government. I presented on the Kenya’s open data journey, looking back…
Read articleAt Open Institute we are thrilled that our very own Al Kags has been selected as one of the inaugural cohort of Washington fellows, under the Young African Leadership Initiative. Joining 45 other Kenyan fellows, he will be in the US for three months most of which will be spent at Open The Government, a…
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In November last year, as the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education exams were being held, we released data that we have collected relating to primary (or elementary in some countries) school education in Kenya. Through KCPE Trends, we released KCPE results data with the view of stimulating conversations about education standards in Kenya. In doing…
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It has been just over a year since Kenya formed a decentralised form of government, devolving into 47 county governments accompanied by central government. The rationale behind devolution was to transfer the power and responsibility from central to local governments in the spirit of empowering citizens by empowering their local leaders with the responsibility, resources…
Read articleThe Council of Governors (CoG) hosted to a two-day inaugural Devolution Conference held on 3rd and 4th April in Kwale County. The conference, titled “One Year into Devolution: Celebrating the Milestones, Overcoming the Challenges” saw leaders from across the country descend upon Kwale to reflect and learn from the experiences they faced in implementing devolution.
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December 2013 – April 2014 When we left the incubation by AMI, our first project was Open Duka, which soon became a pet project. It was supported by Hivos East Africa. Through Open Duka, we aim to provide citizens, journalists, and civic activists with a practical and easy-to-use tool to understand the ownership structure of…
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