TELCOS
Vodacom will appeal; Safaricom is "reviewing the judgment"
A day after the High Court voided the 15% stake sale, Vodacom said it will lodge an appeal with the Court of Appeal and seek a stay pending determination. Safaricom's response, through company secretary Linda Mesa Wambani, was that it is reviewing the judgment and its implications. The market split the difference: Vodacom fell nearly 4% in Johannesburg before recovering some ground, while Safaricom rose about 2.2% in Nairobi. The transaction was worth roughly $1.9 billion in total — about $1.6 billion cash to the Treasury plus $320 million from dividend securitisation — which is what the government could be asked to refund if the appeal fails. Both say operations continue regardless.
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SKILLS
TikTok starts collecting tax details from Kenyan creators
Creators have received a notice asking for name, email, country of residence and residency status, with a residential address optional. Reported rates are 5% for residents and 20% for non-residents, though TikTok has not confirmed the figures or their scope. Nothing else is confirmed either: no deadline, no word on which payout programmes are covered — LIVE Gifts, Video Gifts, subscriptions and Work With Artist are what Kenya has — no clarity on whether a KRA PIN will be demanded later, and no stated method for giving creators their withholding records. The underlying obligation is not new; it comes from the Finance Bill 2023. Google began withholding 5% on Kenyan YouTube earnings earlier this month.
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GOVERNMENT
Kenya takes a Konza cloud expansion and a spaceport to Seoul
The Treasury's PPP Directorate, under director general Kefa Seda, presented 13 priority infrastructure opportunities at the Global Infrastructure Cooperation Conference in Seoul. The furthest along is the Konza National Data Centre cloud expansion, which has a feasibility study proposing a design-build-finance-operate-transfer deal over a 36-month period covering design, approvals, partner procurement, financial close and commissioning; the existing site runs a multi-zone Tier III OpenStack environment. Also pitched: a spaceport at Kipini between Malindi and Lamu, where the Kenya Space Agency was still extending transaction-advisory bid deadlines in March, and a 160-acre Digital Media City with South Korean backing. A feasibility study is not an investor, and none of the three has financing confirmed.
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INFRASTRUCTURE
Kenya is second in Africa for EV chargers — and 71% of the use is Nairobi
235 charging stations in 2025 put Kenya behind Egypt's 300 and ahead of Ethiopia's 100 and Rwanda's 40. The distribution is the caveat: Nairobi accounted for 71% of Kenya Power's cumulative EV-charging revenue between July 2023 and April 2026, a total of KSh382 million over 34 months, with expansion only now reaching highways and Mombasa, Kisumu, Eldoret, Nakuru and Nyeri. Most of the network was built for commercial fleets — BasiGo's buses, its Rubis forecourt partnership — rather than private drivers, which is why a station count flatters the picture.
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STARTUPS
Bolt's Comfort tier grew sixfold, and reached Mombasa
Ride volume in the premium category is up sixfold year on year, monthly passengers more than fivefold, and the driver pool has almost tripled since launch in June 2025 — enough density to cut pickup times an estimated 18%. Comfort drivers need a 4.8-star minimum and vehicle inspections through a local partner, with re-inspections; the tier averages about 4.9 stars. Mombasa, added in May 2026, is the first market outside Nairobi. Bolt has not published absolute ride numbers, revenue, the fare premium over standard, or Comfort's share of the platform — so the multiples are growth off a base nobody outside the company can see.
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