Ruto nominates Lydia Sitienei Chelagat as Kenya's next Data Commissioner
Government Spokesperson Charles Owino Wahong'o announced the nomination on Monday 9 November, saying the President acted on the recommendation of the Public Service Commission. Her name now goes to the National Assembly for consideration under the Data Protection Act, so she is not yet in office. The recruitment drew 152 applications; the PSC shortlisted 13 candidates and scheduled interviews for 5 October. Chelagat would succeed Immaculate Kassait, who set up the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner and led it for six years. At Kassait's farewell dinner on 5 November, Dorothy Jemator of the Commission on Administrative Justice said she leaves an institution with its own identity and a growing body of rulings and guidance, and that the two bodies are working on joint advice where access to information and privacy meet. The office matters to anyone who builds or uses digital products in Kenya: it decides complaints about how companies and public bodies collect, store and share personal data, and it has built an enforcement record across sectors that handle sensitive information. Whoever leads it next inherits the questions that have arrived since, including how the law applies to AI systems.
Sources: TechTrends
